


P.S. I Love You

by Triddlegrl



Series: Pretty Woman [1]
Category: Glee
Genre: Infidelity, M/M, Unsafe Sex
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-10-06
Updated: 2014-04-15
Packaged: 2017-12-28 13:36:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 24,064
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/992593
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Triddlegrl/pseuds/Triddlegrl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>You know how most people's stories go. Boy meets girl and it's right from the start, they slay a few dragons and then it's happily ever after. Well this isn't that story. This is the story of a boy who met a boy at just the right time when both of them were wrong; but never for each other. Oh. And this is also a lesson on why you should always write a post script.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> In honer of [Klaineweek 2013](http://www.tumblr.com/tagged/klaineweek2013) on tumblr for the prompts Naughty + Nice, Anniversary ,and Wedding. This is a Prequel to another fic [Pretty Woman](http://triddlegrl.livejournal.com/13564.html). It's not necessary to read that in order to understand this, but familiarity of course gives it gravitas. In that fic Kurt is a professional escort. In this one he's just a kid lost on the way to ethics class.

To Kurt, my husband.  
 _Forward By Blaine Everett Anderson_

No one prepares you for the nightmare of preparing for a wedding. You’re always telling me that planning the perfect wedding is like planning global take over; the slip of the tiniest detail could have an angry bridezilla storming through your office like it’s D-day. You talk like you hate weddings most days, as if you could do without the tiresome lists and frills that come with finding the right fabric and scouting a venue. If I had a penny for every time you’ve asked me in the last year why you’ve decided to sign yourself up for hell and start a whole fashion line dedicated to the mad affair… I’d have more pennies than I can come up with some trite thing to buy with them.

But we both know why. Behind those rolling eyes is a man who loves romance, who tears up a little when all the madness is through and the only two people in the room who matter have kissed and forgotten everyone else exists. They might have fought hard to get there or it might have been easy up until then; but it won’t be always and for that singular moment everything is perfect. They’re ready to face the world together and you can almost believe nothing will ever touch them again.

The truth is you only roll your eyes to hide how wet they get, and though you’ve always said differently I know you’ve been waiting for this day (our day) as long as I have.

Tomorrow our families will gather together to watch us join our lives together. Only that’s not quite right is it? We both know that our lives have not been separate for many years now, not since a staircase on the way to ethics class, and this step (this marriage we are about to undertake) seems redundant in light of everything. The truth is my time has been yours for longer than I can remember it being mine, my heart even more so.

Isn’t it funny how that doesn’t stop us being nervous? I know it hasn’t stopped you feeling like we’re about to make a mistake. I know you have a past you fear. I know what has kept you up late at night, staring out the window and testing the word can’t on your tongue. You’re afraid, and that’s okay because I’m terrified right with you. I can only hope you don’t fear that the world learning anything about you would cause me to love you any less, that I would ever regret for a moment joining my life with yours, because beloved I couldn’t love you less if it meant saving my life.  We’ve sung that song and frankly it doesn’t carry a tune.

Thank god for that.

I want you to know that I don’t regret it, that the only thing I regret about us is how long it took and how much time we wasted. I know by now that I can’t clean out the skeletons in our closet, I can’t chase the demons away and make you feel big where the world tells you that you should feel small. Lucky for me you do a good job of that all on your own. What I can do is love you like I love you, as I have always loved you, and hope that it will all come together. I believe you give me the same, and that gives me belief that we’ll make it. We’ll be okay Kurt, come what may.

My gift to you tomorrow will be this journal, a memoir of the road to loving you, so that when the world gets cold (because it will) you can have something to warm you. So that when we take our wrong turns (because we will) we’ll always have a map to refer to. If we get lost (and we will) we’ll retrace our steps until we find where we went wrong. I only wish I’d had something like this when I thought I’d lost you for good all those years ago, when we feared we might never find each other.

May we always know better.

***

Blaine Anderson is an eighteen year old virgin and he’s not bitter about that at all, thank you very much. He’s not the sort of person to tear himself down (or anyone else for that matter) without just cause, so he doesn’t labor under any false delusion that he’s not attractive and that there aren’t options for breaking his virginal streak. He’s reasonably attractive, musically talented, recreationally athletic, above average intelligence, and as good a guy as good guys get (David’s words, not his).

When guys ask (and sex seems to be all guys want to talk about in the freshman dorms) he tells them that dates were hard to come by at an all-boys private school, but that’s not exactly true because Blaine is happily gay and if one believes the rumors about private schools he could have had dates a plenty. Blaine’s virginity (or inability to wave it goodbye) is directly tied to his being gay and not to a lack of options or desire. To understand this you have to understand Blaine. To do that you have to know how it all began.

The first thing you need to know about Blaine Everett Anderson is that he was born in Dobbs Ferry New York, to Mitchell and Elaine Anderson. That’s important to know because from the day he was born till the day they helped him move into his dorm room at NYU they (and everyone who knew them) never stopped reminding him that it was. His father is the CEO of one of the world’s largest banks (and his father before him) and his mother is one of the most sought after wedding planners in New York.

They are good people as far as people go. His mother is nurturing and his father a good provider. Neither of them has ever been without money and they are comfortably settled in their careers and social circles. They have two kids (Blaine and his sister Regina) and have never found themselves wanting any more. There is a family dog and a white picket fence, and Mitchell and Elaine are satisfied with a job well done. They have a beautiful daughter who is smart like both of them, and never takes no for an answer like her father. And then they have Blaine, their boy, who everyone agrees is all Elaine.

Blaine knows that for a long time his father thought fate had got it backwards, that if Mitchell could have he would have made them a Reggie and a Blair, because Regina has everything it takes to take over the family business while Blaine is too much his mother. It took Blaine only nine years to figure out that ‘too much like your mother’ means not man enough, and it took him only nine seconds after coming out to realize that he had broken his father’s heart. He spent the rest of his adolescence trying to make up for that. He is reasonably attractive, respectably athletic, musically talented but studious and focused. He is a freshman business major because it is practical and he has enough in his way if he wants to be ready to run UB one day. He is polite to a default, helpful however he can be, and despite the opportunity he has never had a real boyfriend. It didn’t bother him that much in high school. Despite the rumors about private schools, most of his friends were straight and he had a million clubs and activities to keep him occupied.

College is not so different from boarding school except in one area and that area makes all the difference. For the first time in his life Blaine is at a place where he can get lost, become a number and not a name that everyone recognizes. He is simply Blaine, or Anderson, and nobody but his sister cares to watch what he does or who he sleeps with. Regina is a senior and the type of sister who will help him unpack with their parents while gushing about all her favorite classes, and then turn around and tell him the best party spots as soon as they’ve been waved away. It’s Regina who tells him to start thinking about what he wants, and maybe consider getting laid for once. Blaine is eighteen so he considers it a lot. His parents are hours away and he is an adult. He is free the first time to discover who that adult might be.

So naturally Blaine spends his first semester hanging out with his roommate David and decidedly not getting laid. He does venture out and join a couple of clubs. He joins Vocaholics (the men’s acapella group) because Wes hears him singing in the community bathroom once and practically drags him in to auditions without so much as an introduction. He joins First Performance because the poster tells him it’s a chance to write his own music and share it with someone and something about the idea won’t let him go. His father asks him why he’s filling his resume with frivolous things so Blaine decides to join a Business & Ethics group and take an ethics class second semester.

Blaine meets Kurt on the way to ethics class.

It’s the first day back from winter break and it’s a morning class, one of those obnoxiously early ones that underclassmen get stuck with, and he’d had a late start so he’s in a rush, feet flying down the stairs as he tries to remember the route he memorized before the break (Wes and David are still teasing him about that). He practically bowls over a guy in a green backpack at the bottom of the stairs and he turns for just a moment to throw him an apology when someone else grabs his arm to get his attention.

_“Hey, sorry, I’m Kurt and this is really dumb but do you know where room B303 is by chance?”_

Life is full of moments, some of them big and some of them small, each of them pushing each of us in a new direction and altering our course. Rarely do people stop and think about where they’d be if they hadn’t made their bus that morning or if they’d decided to go here rather than there. The truth is we’re all of us inches from brushing against another life, and that makes the possibilities of our own lives infinite. That’s the beauty of being alive. _And if that darling isn’t reason enough to believe that we can make something beautiful of a life together I don’t know what is._

There was a moment when Blaine Anderson was undefined, not lost so much as waiting to find himself, waiting for education on direction. He’d been sure that he could use something, but unsure what that something was or what it would look like. He is nineteen and undecided, ready for redefining, and then he turns at the bottom of a staircase. And that’s it. It’s not a sonic boom or a crash of thunder, it’s just a moment. And like a lot of moments its significance will not register until it might be too late.

***  
Kurt is fire and Blaine is water. At least that’s the way it seems at first. For starters it’s only second semester and Kurt already has a reputation. He’s the only freshman Blaine knows to have ever caught the eye of a senior literally the first day on campus. Everyone knows that he let Sean Johnson fuck him in a bathroom during freshman mixer, and that all those nude photo spreads hanging in the art department are Sean’s and that Kurt is his favorite model. Kurt only smirks when Blaine gets up the courage to ask about it, and he wishes (not for the first time) that he were half as confident. Kurt never makes any apologies for anything and Blaine seems to always find himself sorry for making messes that come natural.

He’s a fashion design major, which means that even if his ass weren’t on display for the whole campus to ogle at he’d be woefully out of place in the circle of future business leaders of America that Blaine cultivates to satisfy his father’s demands (and truthfully because he has got ideas and it’s nice to talk with people who don’t brush him off). The others try to treat him like a pretty face, but Kurt’s got a razor sharp mind and a swifter tongue, and he seems to take a strange sort of enjoyment out of lacerating Blaine’s classmates with it. He is minoring in business as well so as their studies go on he and Blaine often share classes despite their wildly different friendship circles. Though the others don’t seem to like him much, Blaine comes to think that classes are ten times more interesting when he shares them with Kurt.

Their friends write them off as a case of opposites attract. Kurt’s good at shaking up Blaine’s world and Blaine’s good at keeping Kurt grounded. There’s truth in that he supposes but it’s not as simple as that either. The real truth is in the things not said. The things neither of them has ever voiced before that they can only trust to tell one another.

Kurt tells everyone how much he likes to party, how little he’s interested in following the rules, and how feckless he can be when it comes to anything that doesn’t have to do with work or school; he tells only Blaine why Wicked is one of his favorite musicals, why he thinks Bring Him Home has more emotional resonance than On My Own and Blaine’s the only one he has ever let see him get misty eyed over Being Alive. Mercedes knows that back in Ohio Kurt was bullied out of school, but she doesn’t know that when he was sixteen he swore on his mother’s grave that he’d never think about swallowing pills ever again and that he’d do whatever he had to in order to make it out. Blaine knows that Kurt gets his drunkest when his boyfriend Sean is sleeping with someone else. Those are the nights that Kurt dances his fastest and laughs his loudest, and Blaine will let himself get drawn into Kurt’s whirlwind. He teaches Blaine how to dance like the world is ending.

Kurt’s from Ohio and his love of the city is infectious. The first time they talk outside of class it’s at a coffee shop because Kurt laments before the professor arrives one day that he’s been in New York for months and hasn’t found a decent place to call his own, and Blaine is addicted to the view from Ninth Street Espresso. He invites Kurt with a hope and Kurt accepts on a whim and when they sit at a table by the windows they settle into the space like they’d been painted there.

It becomes their weekly study spot and for a while it’s an unspoken rule that they keep it to themselves. Eventually their friends catch on (Wes on Blaine’s side and Rachel on Kurt’s) and from then on they have company. Neither of them is too upset about that and if they start meeting twice as much it’s only because they find each other a welcome respite from the pressure of school and their other friends.  
Everyone thinks they’re fucking, but they’re not about that.

Nobody gets that. Nobody believes that Kurt Hummel can have a friend just for having one (unless it’s a girl). Kurt doesn’t help (he laughs whenever Blaine points it out, like he thinks it might be true and that’s something really funny). Blaine hates that Charlie in his BLOA group keeps bothering him about an introduction, because Blaine knows that ever since that rumor started about Sean and Kurt doing a three-way started circling, Charlie’s been dying to get a piece of him.

It bothers Blaine that people look at other people like they come sectioned off in a box, spliced up and ready for consumption at the consumers leisure. He doesn’t want Charlie to take anything from Kurt, whether it’s sex or a piece of his time, because Charlie talks about him like he’s fast food. He tells Charlie to fuck off and Charlie tells him he’s stupid if he thinks Kurt’s his boyfriend (because Kurt fucks everybody and Blaine isn’t anybody special). It’s the first fist fight he ever gets in.

_“That snaggle toothed carrot wishes I’d sleep with him,”_ Kurt scoffs later as he ices Blaine’s knuckles. _“Did you see what he had on today? You’d have to pay me to get near him. Like really good money, and that’s coming from me.”_

Kurt has a way of saying meaningful things without actually having to say them. When he climbs in bed with Blaine and types out a paper while Blaine dictates (because his hands are swollen and he feels miserable) that’s his way of saying thank you.

After the fist fight everyone thinks they’re fucking, and that Blaine is pining, but they both know they’re not about that.

Kurt sees a Blaine that nobody else sees. He quickly figures out that behind the button up shirts and khaki pants there is a young man in Blaine who is hungry for all that life offers. Kurt loves to sing and once he figures out that Blaine loves it too he won’t let him stop. He won’t let Blaine quit First Performance no matter how much Blaine’s dad rags on him. He tells Blaine when his lyrics are stupid and when they could be genius. Blaine invites his family to his first show and Kurt’s the one to stand up first and cheer the loudest. Blaine’s sister is there but his parents are noticeably absent. His mother sends him a care package and an apology. They had important business.

The first time that Blaine admits that he’s angry with his parents he’s drinking beer in Kurt’s bed and Kurt holds his face like he can prevent it from cracking. They kiss because Blaine’s lips brush against Kurt’s cheek as he chokes on his confessions and Blaine needs something to anchor him to earth. When Blaine whispers that it’s his first Kurt goes still and terrified in the eyes; Blaine knows that now he’ll have to be the fearless one.

_“Not bad for a first. One more? In case I don’t remember it in the morning?”_

By the time they are juniors Blaine will be the only guy at NYU Kurt hasn’t had sex with (or so the rumor goes).

Freshman year Blaine is the only one who knows that the three-way was Sean’s idea, that NYU’s most infamous couple started with a freshman at a mixer and a senior who told him he was gorgeous. Blaine knows that it started with Kurt wanting Sean and nothing else, and it ended when he found out Sean wanted Kurt and every other gorgeous thing he could touch. Everybody knows that Kurt let Sean have everything he wanted and more, and that Kurt was happy to give it until a month before spring semester ended when Sean decided he needed to get serious about his art and find a new muse.

Everybody knows that when Sean dumped him Kurt didn’t come to class for a straight week. They don’t know how many times Blaine went to his dorm every night only to be turned away by his roommate. They don’t know about all the unanswered calls and texts on Blaine’s end and the one call Kurt makes when he’s desperate for a friend. When Kurt finally calls late on Thursday night, twice as tired as he is drunk, they meet in the park and they lay in the grass. Kurt tells Blaine what nobody else will ever hear.

_“I knew going in that we were casual, it’s so stupid to expect more. S-so, dumb, and I agreed to it! I know… I knew what we were doing so this is really fucking stupid, being this upset.”_

_“It’s okay to be upset Kurt, you’ve lost someone you love—”_

_“Don’t! Please don’t,”_ that’s the sound of panic in his voice. _“Sean Johnson? We fucked more than we talked and that’s just as well because we had absolutely nothing in common. What’s love got to do with it anyway? We fucked and he was boring most the time, and there will be other people to fuck who won’t kill my brain cells with their tired old bullshit. So do me a favor and don’t bring love into it, Blaine. God not everything’s a fucking afternoon special!”_

So Blaine doesn’t. Kurt’s words are brave (they always are) but there is a fault line in his voice (there always is) and just the fact that  
Kurt lets it shake in his presence tells all. It’s also a privilege and Blaine knows that at the first sign that he cares too much Kurt will be gone.

***

Kurt and Regina are a match made in heaven (or hell as Blaine often complains). They meet a few weeks into the semester and bond over a shared eye for trends and a passion for teasing Blaine about his all American boy attire. Latter they rag on him for his attempts at rebellion through wardrobe, but they both buy him bowties they think he might like even though Mitchell has made it known that he’s not fond of this new phase.

But Blaine loves his High Waters and his bowties and never feels anything else quite like he does when he has got a mic in his hands and his hips rocking to a beat; and if his smile looks like it knows a secret it’s because usually Kurt is dancing next to him and looks at him like he knows it too. Regina can’t resist poking her nose where it doesn’t belong and wrangles Kurt into setting him up on a blind date. Kurt seems to jump on the idea, because Kurt is firmly of the opinion that Blaine’s virginity is a crime.

Matt is funny and interesting so Blaine has no reason to say no to a second date. A second date becomes a third and before Blaine knows it he has a boyfriend. The only problem is he has no idea what to do with him and even more troubling he really doesn’t have much motivation to figure it out. He and Matt are happy and comfortable to take things as slow as they want and he never figures out why but the more time goes on the more Kurt seems to dislike it.

When Kurt is hurt he becomes defensive and Blaine learns the hard way that a defensive Kurt lashes out and he aims to wound.

_“Can’t you tell him you’re sick with a case of the measles or something?”_

_“Kurt I’m not going to rearrange my date okay. You cancel on me every time there’s a chance you might get laid.”_

_“Oh excuse me for not giving a fuck about your date when we both know it’s wasted on you anyway.”_

_“What the hell does that mean?!”_

_“It means the chances of you finally growing a pair and committing to being gay in more than name are about as likely as me agreeing to model for Abercrombie.”_

_“Oh fuck you Kurt.”_

_“Would you please? I’m beginning to think you don’t know where to put it.”_

Sometimes they fight like they want to break each other into pieces. It’s like Kurt wants to push him over the edge, and the harder he pushes the more Blaine wants to claw at him. Blaine imagines that he could shatter Kurt with a word and he knows that any therapist would have a field day with him if he ever tried to explain it.  But it’s never malicious. He never wants to wreck Kurt for ill. If it’s possible to take someone down for all that you love them, Blaine feels it. He knows it would turn out for the better because his hands are gentle and his heart always aches to put them back together again and he knows that Kurt feels the same.

He knows that one day they might splinter but it’s a risk he can’t avoid. So he wonders instead what their pieces will make when they finally break on each other.

For all that Kurt cuts him he cuts in the right direction because he has told the truth. Blaine is afraid. He decides not to be afraid anymore and he eventually loses his virginity to a man he trusts. It’s Matt’s first time too and he’s more comfortable bottoming which works out well because Blaine isn’t quite feeling up to it yet. It’s awkward and over almost before it begins, but that makes it perfect. Almost. It’s the almost that will eventually be their reason for parting.

**From Kurt Hummel:** I never should have said that to you.

**To Kurt Hummel:** It was true.

**From Kurt Hummel:** No it’s not. You aren’t a coward. You have no idea how brave you are.

**To Kurt Hummel:** Not as brave as you. :)

**From Kurt Hummel:** Coffee?

**To Kurt Hummel:** 20 minutes?

Sometimes they fight like they want to break each other; they always come back because when they feel the most broken is without each other.

 TBC in Part Two

A/N: An anon on Tumblr asked for my writer’s playlist for this fic, as I had shared the one for Pretty woman. I’ve decided to share three songs per part because I’m a nerd over music like this. Those will be tagged PSILY Music Post, and you can find the first [here](http://triddlegrl.livejournal.com/35231.html).  



	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _See you had a lot of crooks try to steal your heart_  
>  Never really had luck, couldn’t never figure out  
> How To Love- Lil Wayne, How To Love

In high school they lived for summer, whiling away each hour until that final bell, but that first summer in college is strange. Going home feels like going backwards and neither of their parents are ready to deal with the people they've become out of sight and on their own. Kurt left Ohio barely out to his father and harassed by his peers regardless of a word spoken. Burt knows a Kurt who wears layers like armor and doesn’t let anyone close to him so that no matter how anyone shoves he can’t be touched, which is a double edged sword because touch is all Kurt wants in the world.  
  
Kurt comes back with New York on his skin, with urban sophistication for a shield and his body for weaponry. Burt has no idea what to do with a sexulized Kurt, a Kurt who dresses not solely to impress but to seduce, who flaunts himself and his sexuality so flagrantly most of his former bullies steer clear of him out of sheer fear. All it takes is Kurt getting caught with one of the guys at the garage (a straight guy with a kid on the way) and suddenly all of the guys are afraid of getting too close.  
  
For the first month Burt says nothing, because sex was never something he and Kurt were comfortable talking about and truthfully he is way in over his head when it comes to what two guys should or shouldn’t get up to. He doesn’t want to be overbearing. He remembers being young and Kurt is an adult now. If he wants to have sex there isn’t shame in it and it’s not really his business anymore. Maybe it was back when Kurt was in high school, but Kurt hadn’t exactly had any options back then. Exactly the opposite actually. So for a time Burt can ignore it, secretly glad that he dodged the bullet of awkward sex talks with his teen. Walking in on his son giving Stanley head in his own office is a little too much however even for Burt.  
  
They have a frank talk about sex, about the fact that Kurt has had it multiple times now over in New York and Burt can see how strung he is behind that new confidence. Behind new Kurt is the same little boy and he’s afraid of what his father thinks of the man he saw giving another man head. Burt can’t say he’s thrilled about the fact that Kurt doesn’t seem all that phased about messing around with a married man ( _I’m not the one cheating dad_ ) but he promises himself he’ll make more of an effort with Kurt, to get more comfortable and to educate himself. He’s ashamed he hasn’t done it before now.  
  
Blaine knows that adjusting to your children leaving the nest is a natural process that most parents go through. He also knows it's going to be a struggle on Elaine's end. At the start of summer break is Regina's graduation, and she cries through the whole ceremony gripping his hand like if she just hangs on tight enough she can keep him from ever taking Regina’s place on that stage.  
  
He hopes that in the end it won't have to be him who breaks it to her that she can't. At the graduation it doesn't look good. She's got the whole day planned for all of them and wants to repack all of his things (so they don't wrinkle) and meet all his friends (especially Kurt).  
  
Blaine had actually hoped to catch Kurt before his flight out to Ohio that afternoon, his clothes are fine and packed well enough thank you, and the last thing he plans to do is introduce his parents to Kurt Hummel any day soon.  
  
He's not ashamed of Kurt or anything he represents, but most days he has a hard enough time figuring out what being gay means to _him_ and he doesn't care to define Kurt (who refuses definition anyway) to Mitchell who just won't get him. And it's all an ugly circle because _why_ can’t his father just accept Kurt? What’s so bad about Kurt? What’s so wrong about looking different (looking gay) and acting different (not hiding who you are, not being afraid to kiss your boyfriend anywhere you want to)? Would it be so horrible for his father if Blaine wanted to look different and act different too?  
  
The first month at home without Kurt is dull. He interns at UB and he enjoys it mostly (he doesn’t not like business, he just wishes it felt like more of a choice) and he doesn’t even mind the teasing about being the boss’s son (mostly it’s good natured, but then again no one’s dumb enough for it not to be). He hangs out with his friends from high school and invites David and Wes out on a weekend but mostly he utterly exhausts his fingers texting Kurt with every thought that pops into his head and responding to the constant vibration of his phone.  
  
Neither his boyfriend or his father are thrilled with how much he talks to Kurt. Marcus complains they don’t talk enough, that he misses him, that a summer is too long to go without seeing each other. Blaine thinks of Kurt all the way in Ohio and agrees that Marcus has a point, distance absolutely sucks. Regina goes to London with a group of friends for a belated graduation present so Blaine doesn’t have her around to buffer things between him and Mitchell, so despite the boyfriends begging he doesn’t invite him up.  
  
When they break up Blaine can’t say it was a surprise but it still hurts. He doesn’t go to work that day, locks his door on both his parents and Skypes with Kurt.  
  
 _“He said he’d found someone else?”_ Kurt asks and for the third time Blaine thinks that Kurt’s hair is nothing like he has ever worn it in New York ( freshly showered and swept back with a headband as he applies cream to his face) and he almost smiles as he shrugs.  
  
 _“Not really, but I got that feeling. He said we’d both lost interest so we might as well call it off.”_  
  
Kurt snorts in response to that. _“Oh please. You know that’s bullshit right? I’d respect him a lot more if he’d just come out and said ‘I’m banging the lifeguard at the pool now’, but whatever. This is exactly why I’m never doing the whole boyfriend thing again, I mean who needs all this pointless drama.”_ He looks up and catches Blaine’s eye, must see the pain on his face because he winces and lowers his hands with a sigh. _“Sorry. This isn’t about me. Are you okay?”_  
  
Blaine shrugs. He knows he will be given some time. He’s heard that first love is hard to get over but maybe he’s defective because letting go of Marcus is as easy as getting out of bed after a dream he only half remembers.  
  
 _“I wish I could be there. I’d take you out Mr. Mopey. You’re too young and hot to be bent out of shape over Marcus Field. The guy wore flannel.”_  
  
“You introduced us Kurt!”  
  
“Yeah well even I have my moments of imperfection.”  
  
“Kurt Hummel? Never.”  
  
“Don’t sass me Anderson, you’re the one eating B &J’s in your sweatpants.”  
  
Kurt comes to Dobbs Ferry that summer because Elaine has a hard time letting go of her baby, and when he’s heartbroken and locked up in his room she’s all for giving him time to think on his own, but not before she sees him and knows for herself that he isn’t breaking. There’s not a room in the house she doesn’t have a key to (his included) and when she finally decides enough is enough and invades his sanctuary it’s to find him splayed out relaxed on his bed with his laptop perched on his stomach and the kind of smile on his face that she’s always wanted someone to put there.  
  
Elaine suspected and now she knows. She knows before either of them ever do, but in their defense she’s a mother and she’s got ten times their experience.  
  
Blaine sits up like someone just shouted for roll call and catches himself mid motion to glare at her and inform her that doors lock for a reason. She tells him they need to talk. They talk about love: a mothers love for her son and a boys love for himself and how true courage is being true to yourself. She says that she’ll love whoever he decides to be and that his father may need time but not to do anything different.  
  
“Don’t you dare.”  
  
She holds him like he’s still her baby and Blaine lets her because he knows he always will be. He knows he’s blessed. He knows that this embrace, this voice of acceptance, this solidarity of self only his mother seems able to give him is something Kurt has ached for for eleven years and counting. He wonders who holds Kurt and tells him they’ll love whoever he is no matter what. That night he hears his parents arguing behind a closed door and he knows it’s about him. It eats at him like a parasite but he takes a deep breath and takes his mother's words to heart. He isn’t going to change anything. Not anymore.  
  
In the morning his dad gruffly suggests he invite his friends up for the following weekend and when Blaine reminds him that it’s the annual Anderson family gathering at their summer home Mitchell says that Regina called to say that she’s bringing some boy, so Blaine might as well bring a friend too. Mitchell says he’s already talked to Elaine and that she’s fine with it and Blaine knows that it was his mother's idea in the first place but it still means something that his father agreed. They both know a friend means Kurt, the one friend of Blaine’s who Mitchell wishes he could wish away.  
  
It stings a bit when Mitchell suggests inviting Wes and David along as well, but Blaine can’t exactly get too upset about spending time with his three best friends. Especially if it distracts his relatives from having to think about him, his love life, or asking if he votes democratic like it’s almost a bigger disappointment than being gay.  
  
That first summer changes everything.  
  
Elaine loves Regina’s new boyfriend Tyler because he treats her like she’s royalty. Regina is just fine with that arrangement and looks at him like she’s got plans for him. Blaine feels sorry for the guy and hopes he doesn’t screw up because Hell hath no fury like Regina scorned. Elaine loves his friends too because they love him and despite all his worry she takes to Kurt like she can smell the wound of his motherlessness and has been decreed by god himself to mother the lost.  
  
It’s funny at first how surprised Kurt is by the attention, how wide his eyes get every time Elaine genuinely gets excited about his scribbles on napkins (that may one day become fashions). She pulls Kurt into her office (she has one back at the main house too, you never know when inspiration will strike) and they spend so long going over bridal gowns and the wedding that Kurt planned for his father and stepmother that Wes and David have to help him steal his best friend back.  
  
His father is his father, so he doesn’t say much beyond “fashion. That’s nice”. Kurt is Kurt and pretends not to mind it or any of Blaine’s cousins questions, or his grandmothers invasive questions about his political affiliations. He shines as bright as he always has, and is just as unconventional as he always dares to be and Blaine watches him with so much pride he doesn’t know how it can all fit inside.  
  
But he knows Kurt better than anybody and he’s smiling too big, laughing too loud, and moving too fast like he always does when he’s running from pain.  
  
It’s not until after dinner the last night at the summer house that Blaine knows for sure. Elaine likes entertainment after dinner and she likes nothing better than to force her children to perform for her enjoyment so he and Regina are forced to play her favorite classics (Blaine on the piano and Regina on her violin). They finish out with a tender rendition of Part Of Your World from the Little Mermaid at the bequest of his youngest cousin and Kurt’s acidic remark that he’s going to have his dentist check for cavities is at odds with how bright his eyes are, like he might be on the verge of tears. Blaine knows something is very wrong.  
  
Regina lets the cat out of the bag that Kurt can sing and there’s nothing for it after that. Elaine won’t let him breathe until he agrees to sing something and for the first time Blaine watches his unshakable confidence waver, sees the scared boy underneath and he can't let Kurt do it alone. He looks at Blaine like he’s sunlight in a world gone dark and Blaine wonders why Kurt doesn’t know he’d do anything for the boy who hung the moon.  
  
Regina suggests a popular favorite of hers (a love song because she’s an asshole like that) and since they both know it they can’t wheedle out of it. And so they sing by the piano in the parlor, the same piano that Blaine has played on a hundred times before when he needs peace, when he searches for comfort, the same piano they will sing by when their world crashes in years from then in this very house and they need to gather their pieces.  
  
 _Settle down with me_  
  
Cover me up  
  
Cuddle me in  
  
Lie down with me  
  
And hold me in your arms  
  
You should know that this isn’t the moment that changes everything, but it is the catalyst. Because Blaine’s singing with Kurt in the parlor of his family’s summer home. It’s not a perfect moment and the room is not full of perfect people but Elaine guards them like a lioness, daring anyone to say anything about her very gay son singing a love song with his very male best friend, Regina’s smiling at them like she knows a secret and Kurt’s standing there like he’s naked and Blaine wants to pull him in close and cover him, draw him inside so that he is always warm and perfectly kept.  
  
 _Settle down with me_  
  
And I'll be your safety  
  
You'll be my lady  
  
I was made to keep your body warm  
  
But I'm cold as the wind blows so hold me in your arms  
  
But That’s not what Kurt wants. Blaine has always known that Kurt’s not the sort of guy who likes the romantic and relationships stress him out. He loved just once (and never admits it). A guy named Sean who took too much and hurt too deep and Kurt doesn’t have anything left to give to some clingy boyfriend with expectations. He knows that. It changes nothing. Blaine reminds himself of Kurt’s professions almost daily but it hasn’t stopped the wish from growing in his heart, in the dark despite lack of sunlight and rain like a persistent weed. It’s just that Kurt’s not as cold as he pretends, not as strong as he looks, and that’s okay. Blaine just wants to hold him up when he’s not, tangle them together to fight off the chill until they’re both sweaty and hot and they forget that anything but the heat they generate exists.  
  
 _Yeah I've been feeling everything_  
  
From hate to love  
  
From love to lust  
  
From lust to truth  
  
I guess that's how I know you  
  
So I hold you close to help you give it up  
  
But Kurt will look at him sometimes, when they’re walking, when they’re laughing, when they’re screaming at each other... he’ll look at Blaine just like this, like he’s made of stars, like they were born from heat and light and they’re too bright to look at when they come together.  
  
 _So kiss me like you wanna be loved_  
  
You wanna be loved  
  
You wanna be loved  
  
This feels like falling in love  
  
Falling in love  
  
We're falling in love  
  
That summer Blaine sings a duet with his best friend and his mother looks at them like she can see through and past them into a future that’s red and bloody, but she claps for them and tells Kurt he sings like an angel. Wes and David tease them, Regina and Tyler cuddle together and thank them for a beautiful song. Blaine’s grandmother snores, his cousins whine for more Disney and Kurt is quiet for the rest of the evening. So quiet that Blaine loses him in the hub bub of moving young bodies to bed and hauling grandma into her wheelchair.  
  
It’s not until later that Blaine goes searching and finds him sitting alone on the dock, curled up beneath the stars and staring out at the black water. Blaine sits beside him and says nothing. Kurt needs space, but more than that he just needs to know someone else is there.  
  
 _“Sean called me.”_ Kurt says when he’s ready. _“Wants me to come out to LA. He’s got some big thing he’s doing with a studio and says my look is perfect for it. What do you think Blaine? Would I make a good model?”_  
  
He’s beautiful. He’d make a good anything Blaine thinks and it’s not just bias. There’s a reason Sean Johnson has photos of Kurt spread all over the art center, there’s something about the way Kurt’s face looks cast in shadow, his eyes reflecting starlight, that Blaine knows any photographer would kill to capture, but his insides go molten with hate when he thinks about Sean. The man takes too much and cares too little.  
  
 _“You’re too good for that Kurt.”_ Too good for him. Don’t go to California just so he can use what’s left of you. It won’t last, Blaine thinks, and then what will happen? Kurt stares at the sky for a long time before he finally laughs.  
  
 _“Damn right I am. Fucker didn’t even offer to pay me.”_  
  
“You know Sean, his dick is payment enough. I mean 10 inches.” Kurt stares at him startled before he throws back his head and cackles.  
  
 _“He wishes. More like five, on a good night.”_  
  
“Or mid morning in the sound booth.”  
  
“You promised you’d never mention that again.”  
  
“You’re the one who sex dialed me.”  
  
“It’s called a butt dial, and Blaine Everett Anderson, I’m shocked at you. What happened to my sweet baby prince?”  
  
“He met you.”  
  
“Lucky him.”  
  
“Yes.” Blaine says as they lean shoulder to shoulder. _“Lucky me.”_  
  
Moments are small things. They come and sometimes we don’t realize their significance until long after they’ve gone.  
  
You’ll be pleased to know darling that this moment is not one of them. This is the moment Blaine first realizes he’s in love with his best friend.  
  
That summer changes everything.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  _Last night I dreamt the whole night long_  
>  _I woke with a head full of songs_  
>  _I spent the whole day_  
>  _I wrote 'em down, but its a shame_  
>  _(teach me how to use the love people say you make)_  
>  _Tonight I'll burn the lyrics,_  
>  _'Cause every chorus was your name_  
>  -"Laundry Room", The Avett Brothers

The three years that pass after that are the greatest (mis)adventure of Blaine’s life. Blaine is in love with his best friend and everyone knows it, but part of loving Kurt is understanding him like no one else does, listening to the things he won’t ever admit to anyone else. It’s not that they’re not themselves when they’re with other people; it’s that only with each other do they feel their most real. They are an ocean, candid and clear with light catching their coral and their depths hungry for exploration. It’s a gift how Kurt grips him with fearful hands and dives with him into their mysteries; searching the sea of twisted wants and unspoken desires that course within themselves for the truth of who they are and who they want to be. He feels his most human when he’s with Kurt, knows with comfortable certainty how he was born to hurt so deeply at a careless word, to feel radiant joy over a hand in his and crisp spring breeze on his cheeks, to feel rooted on the observation deck of a castle in an urban kingdom.

Kurt’s favorite spot in all of New York is Belevedere Castle because it’s a place that feels like wishes might take seed. He fell in love with it his first week in New York, his first week on his own with the world at his feet and the desperate desire to finally find a place in it thrumming in his heart. It’s the one bit of romanticism that he still allows himself and whenever they walk in the park together they stop there and they let themselves be young men with the world at their feet. They’ve got wings on their backs that could catch a wind and fly them to every possibility.

 _“I want to go to Paris and eat gorgeous food and not give a shit about my body. I want to have sex on a balcony in Venice and lick gelato out of someone’s mouth in the summer time. I want to be the best dressed person on the street and have everyone ask me who I’m wearing and I’ll say ‘this is me’ I made this. Most of all I want to see the ocean,”_ Kurt whispers when the lights are low and their minds hum with the pleasant buzz of just the right amount of alcohol. He’s beautiful covered in sweat from a night of dancing and Blaine would sell anything but their friendship for a chance to bury his hands in that rucked up hair.

Blaine takes Italian because Kurt’s taking French and one of them should know how to speak Italian if they’re going to buy gelato in Venice and find a hotel with a balcony. He has no doubt that Kurt will make all his dreams come true, so the closer they get to graduation the more he’s forced to think about the future and a life without him. Blaine knows he doesn’t want it the way he knows he doesn’t want cancer, it’s just a given.

He learns that Belevedere means ‘beautiful view’ in Italian and when he tells Kurt, Kurt says _”that’s why I love it”_. Blaine thinks ‘that’s why I love you’. Loving Kurt is like being lifted to the clouds to watch the sun rise; it’s a gift in vantage point. They watch the Notebook (because Kurt pretends to hate it and Blaine pretends to love it twice as much to satisfy them both) and he thinks he wants to change his occupation from student to bird watcher; because if Kurt’s a bird then he’s a bird and Kurt’s sure to fly away one day. And that’s okay as long as he’s allowed to follow.

Blaine’s in love with his best friend and everyone but Kurt knows that Kurt loves him back. Loving Kurt is about 10% action, 30% instinct, and 60% standing by. Blaine can’t bring himself to seriously date anyone else. He tries a couple of times to take Kurt’s advice to just get laid and have fun with it but he never feels right afterwards. He knows he only really wants Kurt and everyone else is just a substitute. He doesn’t know how anyone can know Kurt like he does and be comfortable using people to assuage their needs and then discarding them like dirty dishes.

 _“Blaine, you’ve got to do this,”_ Kurt says when they’re juniors and Blaine hardly dares to believe. He’s been offered an internship with Blackbird Records and he owes it all to Kurt really. One of the guys Kurt’s been seeing (Blaine can’t keep all their names straight anymore so he gives them all nicknames based on their occupations or fashion choices) is a DJ at The Copacabana and he drags Blaine and the girls out with him on a night to take advantage of free entrance.

Blaine is having fun dancing with Rachel and Mercedes in turns and fending off the guys Kurt keeps pushing his way with practiced ease. But Ren has a great smile and an easy going charm that catches him off guard and before he knows it they are dancing and talking about music. They grab seats at the bar to talk about the industry and the trials of running a record label, and Blaine’s not had this much fun or been this challenged by a conversation since Government and Governance in high school. He’s thinking he might give casual sex another try when Ren hands him a card and tells him to look into Blackbird because he’s got great ideas. He says to tell him right then if he’s not interested because otherwise he’d really like to take him home.

When Blaine tells Kurt he snorts.

_“I didn’t know CEO’s were picking up their office fun straight from the bar these days.”_

Kurt’s skeptical opinion of Ren’s motives aside Blaine is interested so they didn’t sleep together, but Blaine deliberates all week on contacting Ren. The more and more he thinks about it the more he wants it, but Mitchell expects Blaine to intern at UB (like he does every summer) and Blaine’s twenty one now and not nineteen. He knows this means standing his ground once and for all. This means a fight that could mean losing his father and in his heart he’s just not as brave as Kurt.

The biggest fight he and Kurt ever have is when Blaine gets an email from Ren with a glowing response to the application essay he never sent.

_“I don’t need you to manage my life Kurt! This isn’t your choice, it’s mine and you had no right to—”_

_“Oh right, because you don’t try and tell me what to do with my life every chance you get. You’re like a pocket grandma just in case poor little Kurt can’t remember to eat his Wheaties and brush his teeth after sucking cock.”_

_“Okay first, what kind of a grandmother did you have? And secondly what the hell are you even talking about?”_

_“Herpes, Blaine, or whatever disease it is of the week that you like to decide to lecture me about just because I have the nerve to have a sex life. Tell me what Web MD said again about crabs Blaine, what’s the likelihood of me getting them if I try and make my way through all of TISCH? I know you know.”_

_“You’re trying to turn this around on me because I care about your body? Somebody has to give a shit about you Kurt, since you’re so determined not to. I mean it’s not like you screen these guys. It isn’t safe; you never know what any of them might have.”_

_“Well I’ll be damned. You’re right. I knew that guy with the puss tasted funny. I’m so glad someone out there has such a tender care for my body. You wanna come over here and inspect for creepy crawlies? It’ll be the most action you’ve seen in months.”_

_“Fuck you, Kurt and fuck this! I don’t have to stay if you’re just going to be a bitch. You’re just awful some—”_

_“And you deserve better! You deserve so, so, much better Blaine than half a life built on somebody else’s dreams and someone has to believe in you if you won’t!”_

It probably comes as no surprise to you that they kiss after that. It’s the third time they’ve ever kissed and it’s violent with tongues and teeth that wage war upon each other’s flesh and there’s something so satisfying about the edge of the table digging into Blaine’s waist and the bend in his spine as Kurt leans over him, so long as he’s allowed to bury his hands like this in Kurt’s hair and hold on for dear life. He’s never been kissed like this before; Kurt’s mouth is an inferno to set his blood to boil and he’s fine with that, so, so, fine with that. Kurt’s lips leave his and move down Blaine’s neck, desperate and biting and the pressure of his hands on Blaine’s waist guide him to lift and Blaine awkwardly sits himself on the table.

Whatever was on it (books and things) is quickly swept aside as he falls back and Kurt’s sure hands drag his hips as close to the edge as they can get . And then he steps between Blaine’s legs and they’re kissing again as Kurt’s skillful hand undoes his buttons and slips inside his jeans.

Blaine’s had sex with exactly three guys in his life, only two of them multiple times (and Greg only twice). Each time he has topped and each time he has carefully explored his partner and tested his personal limits like a child wading into the deep end. This is entirely different. This is hunger like he has only ever felt it with Kurt, rushing up from somewhere in his middle and gnawing on his heart strings. He’s dying for every touch of Kurt’s skin against his and he’s utterly helpless for it. Kurt could split him open—does with each hard stroke of Blaine’s cock in his beautiful hands—and leave his bones to bleach out in the sun and Blaine would let him, he’d go white and brittle from inside out so long as sucking on Kurt’s tongue like that will make him mewl like he’s a fragile creature and not the force of nature Blaine knows he is. He comes too hard, too fast and too overwhelming, and he’s still shaking long after Kurt grinds himself to completion and cries out his name like it’s killing him.

Blaine wishes.

 _“Well… I suppose we were bound to do that sooner or later,”_ Kurt says when they clean themselves up and stand staring at each other. His words are braver than he is and Blaine wants to push at them until they crumble, until neither of them has a thing to hide behind. But loving Kurt is about handling with care. It’s a gift in vantage point and a curse in standing by. He’s got the best view in the world and no space to move in.

_“Kurt I—”_

_“Blaine don’t!”_

_“—love you.”_

Kurt recoils like Blaine has shot him.

 _“Don’t do that. Don’t look like that. Just come here, please…”_ Blaine reaches for him and Kurt backs up raising a hand to keep him back, swallowing thickly as he shakes his head.

 _“See this is why I’ve never slept with you! What possessed you to say that?”_ Kurt glares at him like he has done a crime, like Blaine walked up and slapped him for no reason. _“ I don’t want a boyfriend Blaine and you know that! You’ve always known that, so what is it?! What made you think it was a good idea to fall in love with me huh? Who fucking asked you to do that?!”_

 _“Nobody asked me! You think I planned this? It happened because I’m me and you’re you. Because you’re Kurt and I’m Blaine and maybe that means something that doesn’t make any sense but right here.”_ Blaine slaps his hand over his heart and tries to keep his voice steady but he feels like he’s losing his mind. He’s always known losing Kurt was going to feel that way so he needs to prevent that from happening. He needs to make him understand. _“It happened because you’re a pain in the ass 90% of the time but you’re still the most incredible person I’ve ever met. It happened because you make me brave and I need you more than I can stand to live with sometimes; and I don’t need to be your boyfriend. Okay? I want so much more than that. I don’t care what we call each other, Kurt, or what our life looks like or where we go or what you do. I just want you and I don’t care if it’s hard or if it hurts. We’ll work at it. We’ll give it everything we’ve got and we’ll be okay if we don’t let go, and I promise I’ll never be like Sean. I’ll never let you go—”_

 _“That’s what you think this is about?”_ Kurt hisses, batting away the hands that Blaine has gripped his arms with. _“I’m not broken. I don’t fucking need you to fix me Anderson!”_

_“Then what do you want!”_

_“Just stop I—”_

_“What do you want, Kurt, what do you want?!”_

_“I don’t want to lose you!”_ Kurt finally screams and Blaine is stunned still. It’s the first time Blaine has seen Kurt cry since that night on the dock and each of those tears he knows are for him. They were wrought by him, he put them there, he pushed Kurt till his body vibrates and his voice cracks and he sobs out, _“ please don’t make me lose you. Because that’s how it ends, Blaine! I’ll eventually fuck it up and I’ll lose you when you finally realize I’m not what you want.”_

 _“Kurt…”_ But Kurt is striding away from him, steeling his spine and wiping his tears like the breach of his walls never even happened.

_“Take the internship Blaine. You owe it to yourself.”_

And then he’s gone and Blaine realizes he has no business trying to fix someone else when he barely knows what to do for himself. He tries to apologize later, but though Kurt says with his mouth Blaine is forgiven he still keeps a distance between them for the rest of the semester.

Everyone knows Kurt and Blaine had a fight, everyone knows what it was about and everyone knows that when Sean calls Kurt about some big fashion show he’ll be shooting that summer (and the friend of his that’s interested in his designs) that Kurt decides to go to Paris and that Blaine is the last person to know.

When Kurt does tell him it’s over dinner at a pizza place and only because Mercedes mentions being jealous of all the hot French guys he’s sure to meet in Paris.

_“ I meant to tell you, but I wasn’t even sure I was going to do it at first. You know the modeling thing is not really my favorite, but god knows I can work an outfit with the best of them and I can’t pass this up. I’ll be rubbing elbows with some of the hottest new designers. I’d be crazy not to take this.”_

Blaine lets him go because it’s not Blaine’s choice to make and there’s no _letting_ about it. Kurt is very talented, very motivated, and he’s absolutely right, this is a dream opportunity for any student of fashion and he’d be dumb to pass it up just because his ex is an asshole and Blaine doesn’t like the fact that they’ll be spending months together in the most romantic city in the world. Kurt’s not his for Blaine to have any sort of say in who he sleeps with and how he advances his career is Kurt’s own business.

There shouldn’t be this ash in his mouth and this burning on his tongue to say ugly things he doesn’t mean and knows he’ll regret.

When did it get so ugly between them?

Blaine thinks that if Kurt ever truly forgives him, if things can just go back to the way they were, he’ll never do anything but love him exactly like he needs. If that means never knowing what it feels like to make love on a balcony it’s a small price to pay. He just needs Kurt to come home.

**To: KurtEHummel@NYU.edu**

_Dear Kurt,_

_Since I can’t call and you said it was okay to email … I guess here’s an email? I’m finally biting the bullet here and giving you the apology you deserve. I was going to wait till you got back to say this but the thing is I don’t know if you’ll ever come back. You’re truly amazing Kurt and it wouldn’t surprise me at all if some designer snatched you up or Sean got you to sign some contract deal where you had to model beautiful clothes and be fawned on for the rest of your life. :) I know I can’t compete with Paris so I’m not going to embarrass myself begging you to come back to boring old NYU._

_So I guess I’ve got to say this now. I’m sorry that I didn’t listen when you told me in every way possible that you weren’t interested in a relationship, that I just assumed that I knew you better than you knew you, and that you’d just fall into whatever fantasy I cooked up for us. I’m sorry that I let wanting you get in the way of seeing you and that I turned into such a self-righteous asshole. Your body is your body, and while it’s true that I never want to see it hurt, it’s not true that every time I bring up the number of guys you sleep with it’s only about my fear that you might not be having safe sex. The truth is it’s about me. It’s about how somehow I turned into everyone else who thinks they know something about you by the number of guys you sleep with. It’s about how much I wish you’d let me touch you like that and tell me I’m the only one who is allowed to, and it’s about how much I resent everyone else touching what I wish was solely mine. I’m so sorry for bringing that kind of poison between us._

_I know that desire can generate feelings of possessiveness, love even more so, and for all of it that I do regret Kurt, I will never regret loving you. How do I love you, shall I count the ways? :) I love you like a morning, like a first rain, like starlight in a country sky. I love you nonsensical and with words I can’t put into patterns. You make me crazy and your chaos puts the world to rights. Without you I’d be someone else entirely. Maybe not a bad man but someone less me, less the product of these tender steps you’ve held my hand and guided me through, and therefore a man I don’t wish to know._

_My grandmother used to tell me bible stories growing up, and sometimes I think about the story of David and Jonathan and how they were best friends whose souls knit together, who stood for each other above all things, whose love was greater even than Jonathan’s birthright to a throne and the will of his father the king. Kurt I can safely say I am your Jonathan. I love you as myself. I would strip myself naked and offer you all my princely garments. I’d form a covenant between us to surpass all other bonds. You are my brother, my King, and I love you above the love of women (which is admittedly the easy part). And everyone argues whether they were gay or just the first epic bromance, but the point is Kurt, that love and sex don’t necessarily have to tango. I guess I’m saying that I get that now. I don’t need anything more from you in the romance department than you’re ready of willing to give and I don’t care who either of us are sleeping with or where we go in life. I want you to understand that you’ll always have my love as deep as it can go. You’re going to do amazing things with your life Kurt Elizabeth Hummel and I’ll be your best friend every step of the way._

_Missing you in the big apple,_

_Blaine_

_P.S. Blackbird is amazing. Thanks for everything. Also I heard this great song today: Lego House Ed Sheeran._

**To BlaineEAnderson@NYU.edu**

_Dear Blaine,_

_You’re a massive dork and I don’t think your Nana would appreciate her bible lessons being used in this manner. Biblical gays, Blaine? I’m glad you stood up to your dad about Blackbird. I need details in the next email (don’t think I’m going to let you get away with tacking that into a post script). Paris is everything I thought it would be and more. The food is delicious and the guys aren’t too shabby either. ;) The other models hate me but they’re just jealous because I pull focus. That and I’m sleeping with the boss, but it’s not like they wouldn’t be doing the same if Jack were interested. Also I think Sean is jealous which is just completely stupid and ironic when you think about it. Before you ask, yes a little bit of me feels vindicated. I mean, he dumped me so what’s he so bent out of shape about? Anyway all of it makes for a lot of drama (I bet you can imagine how catty models can be) but you know me, I love competition. Can you hear the nails sharpening from an ocean away? I showed Jack my designs and he said he gave them to Yusef but hasn’t heard anything yet. You know how these things go. It was a long shot anyway._

_Okay so about all of that stuff you wrote. I bet you thought I wasn’t going to comment on it? Lol, no, not even I am that good at avoidance and truthfully I feel I need to say some things too. I feel that as long as you’re going to say sorry for perfectly normal reactions to watching your friend stumble off with some random every other night, I might as well join the party. I’m sorry I applied to Blackbird for you and acted like a giant prick afterwards (mauling you on your kitchen table instead of just saying sorry). I’m sorry I’m always cutting you down and saying things I know will hurt just to see if you’ll react like everyone else. I’m sorry that I keep pushing you at other people and wanting you all to myself even though we both know I can’t give you what you want. The truth is you deserve it Blaine. You deserve someone who loves you the way you need to be loved, the way you want to be, and not some vague date in the future but right now. Someone to love you like you’re special and all they’ll ever want is you for always and forever. Because that’s what you want and it’s not bad to want that. I’m sorry I make you feel like it is._

_And you say I make you brave but right now I don’t feel very brave because the only place I’ll ever say this is on an email with an entire ocean separating us (and I’ll deny it later FYI) but I’m sorry I’m not that guy. I’m sorry because I guess I’m your David. :) You’re the best friend I’ve ever had (fill in all that stuff about stars and armor and covenants and blah blah blah) and I meant what I said, I never want to lose this and I care about you like you were my brother and that goes deep, like you said, so sometimes I do think about what it would be like to date again (which is where I guess the brother thing ends). Sometimes I wonder would happen if we just jumped into something crazy. I dream about it and it’s beautiful but dreams always are. That doesn’t make them real. Ha ha, in reality Blaine I wouldn’t last six minutes in a monogamous relationship and we both know that. The thought of one alone makes me want to organize an orgy. Kind of a relationship destructive impulse wouldn’t you say? So I can’t speak for the first David and Jonathan but I think this bromance should stay platonic don’t you?_

_Also Paris is great but it’s no New York._

_P.S._

_I heard a great song too: Demons Imagine Dragons._

**To: KurtEHummel@NY.edu**

_Quick on my way to class. Demons? Kurt that song is morose as hell!_

_P.S. Your demons don’t scare me. ;)_

**To BlaineEAnderson@NYU.edu**

_Quick, cause he’s not going to be out long. Lego House? Blaine that song sounds like a six year old girl wrote it. A six year old girl named Taylor Swift!_

_P.S. They should. I’ve got the better deal here._


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  _And so it all boils down to this_  
>  We've got our aim but we might miss  
> We are too fragile just to guess  
> And I've been in this place before  
> Fine as we are but we want more  
> That's human nature at its best  
> -"Fools", Lauren Aquilina

Senior year is not a race against time. They want nothing about their last few months together to be rushed. If they could grab time by its tail and drag it to a halt they would. Senior year is about staying up too late to hold onto every second of every day, it’s about lying around on somebody’s couch breathing in the fumes of some recreational drug they’ll one day tell their children it’s stupid to try, and coming to the realization that life is too damn pointlessly hurried. Senior year is lying on their backs and letting time pour over them like a flash storm, watching how it drips from their hair and learning the metal taste it leaves on their lips. They write papers and they sit in libraries. It’s nice to just sit for long hours with nothing but the sound of turning pages between them. They visit over seven different libraries in Manhattan that year, just for the hell of it, and they pick a favorite. They take long walks just to get lost and take pictures of all the interesting things they discover; they wonder why they waited till it’s time to graduate to really discover their city. They dig into New York City soil and they grow roots.

Senior year is when they know that New York is theirs. New York gave birth to their adulthood. It is the beginning of what they’ll make of themselves. By springtime both of them are certain they will never really call another place home. Kurt’s the first to admit it out loud.

_“I think I’m staying local. I never want to leave here.”_

_“My parents want me to move back home… but Dobbs Ferry just isn’t home anymore.”_

_“So we’ll both still be around?”_

_“I guess.”_

_“I think that’s good.”_

_“It’s better than good.”_

They graduate at the top of their class and their parents are proud. Burt and Elaine cry. Mitchell does not say much, but when they are having dinner he makes a toast to the graduates and Blaine can’t remember the last time he heard his dad’s voice crack like that. Everyone wants to know what their plans are (they have for months) but Kurt and Blaine’s plans are mostly lists of things they don’t want. Blaine doesn’t want to work at UB (not yet), he doesn’t want to give up music, he doesn’t want to start a new phase of life that doesn’t include Kurt, and he still doesn’t want to date anyone else.

Kurt doesn’t want to intern in Paris after the drama of the previous summer, he doesn’t want to give up Thursday night jam sessions with First Performance, he doesn’t want Blaine to cut his hair, and he’d rather not be graduating at all if it means having to figure out some new way to live that doesn’t include his best friend.

Six weeks before graduation they walk home from a bar leaning on each other, flushed with their youth and good booze, and they decide that all they want to do with their lives is be happy and make art. David says they should form a band and Rachel nominates herself as lead singer because she wants a Grammy by twenty-five. Kurt says she’s too drunk to talk if she thinks he’s going to sway in the background of the Rachel Berry band, and that she’ll have to pry solos from his cold dead hands.

That’s how Kurt, Blaine, Wes, David, Rachel and Mercedes decide to form an artist’s commune and that’s why six graduates end up sharing a loft.

There’s two bedrooms and a den. The girls share a room with each other while Kurt, Blaine, and David take the second; because he loses at rock paper scissors Wes is left to convert the den into a third bedroom. Kurt does most of the decorating with the girls but he allows Blaine and David to consult when it comes to their bedroom, which mostly means they tag along while Kurt bargain hunts and shoots down all their ideas.

_“Don’t suggest ridiculous things and I wouldn’t have to say no.”_ He insists when they argue over the hammock Blaine wants to buy. There isn’t enough room for thee beds in their room (there’s barely room for one) and Blaine has the idea to hang a hammock up (it will be like falling asleep in a tree every night) but Kurt won’t hear of it.

_“For one you’ll need a chiropractor by weeks end sleeping every night in that thing and more importantly it’s hideous.”_

In the end David gets a single bed, Kurt and Blaine get a full so that they can share because it’s the only compromise both of them can agree on. They can share a bed because they have promised each other they won’t attempt to sleep together again unless Kurt decides he wants to have a go at a real relationship. They are sharing a bed because they are just friends and friends should be able to sleep in the same bed without sleeping together.

Kurt and Blaine are the best of friends and that summer is all about barely getting by and loving every second of it. It’s filled to the brim with music, laughter, and the best cheap food the city has to offer. They bicker with their roommates and they bicker with each other. They discover they can kiss when they’re drunk sometimes without awkwardness the next morning (they both figure if they have to deal with each other’s morning breath and taco night gas a few drunken kisses shouldn’t break anything) so they get drunk often and eat too much junk food, completely at ease with each other. They watch far too much television and bicker about who has the better DVD collection. Most importantly the six of them make music. Every weekend it’s some hot new place where the lighting is low and the crowds are drunk enough to treat them like stars.

That summer is effortless. They bank on their promise of friends forever no matter what and they touch often, hug too long, and share a bed while Kurt savors every brush of skin against skin, bites his lip and considers the possibility of an always. Blaine waits and this time around the waiting feels easy. Maybe it’s because while they’re living on borrowed funds, odd jobs, and young men’s dreams, they’re free to be exactly what they both want to be. In the band they are Kurt & Blaine, in the apartment they are Kurt & Blaine. Kurt & Blaine is a state of being that matches the hearts thudding anticipatorily in their chests; the same hearts that they suspect were manufactured as a set. So while Kurt considers what already is, Blaine waits with the certainty of someone who already has exactly what he wants. What he wants is Kurt near, Kurt for always, and that summer it finally feels like a possibility.

Despite Rachel’s insistence that she has a personal connection with every song that ever existed and that their small following of fans pub crawl solely to hear her emotive performances, Kurt and Blaine’s duets are a crowd favorite and when they land a gig at Joes (their biggest gig yet) Wes is adamant that the show should end on a rousing duet from everyone’s favorite duo.

_“It’s the chemistry Rachel. Their cover of Untouched has the most YouTube hits of any performance we’ve ever done.”_

_“I still think I should have been on lead with Kurt. The Veronicas are female and—”_ Rachel insists and Kurt interrupts her whiny (and what is sure to be no doubt insulting) tirade to throw a balled up sheet of paper at her.

_“Sex. Rachel, he’s talking about sex. With Blaine and I singing about wanting to touch each other and practically dry humping on stage nobody’s going to even care what we sound like.”_

This isn’t exactly true and they all know it. They all know what a big deal this is (it could make or break them). When Blaine hears from Ren and he agrees to come out to give them a listen it only ups the ante. They spend weeks preparing and Kurt and Blaine stay up many nights attempting to perfect a number that’s perfect for them and will really connect with the audience. Usually their duets are pretty balanced, but if one of them has to put a foot forward it’s usually Blaine. Kurt’s voice is amazing, Blaine knows so, but despite his big talk Kurt has always been reluctant to step out and lead. It makes no sense to Blaine because Kurt can’t help but pull focus no matter what he does and he’s so clearly a star it hurts to look directly at him.

Blaine is convinced that Kurt’s flawless vocals combined with his raw sex appeal is the sole reason Rachel’s emotional power ballads don’t drive away their younger followers. Kurt has certainly never lacked for a date after a gig, bu Blaine thinks what this extra special show needs is less of the fun and flirty show they like to put on together and more of everything that makes Kurt powerful and unique, his ability to illustrate the aches and pains of living with melody, to elevate a spirit with a soaring note. Unfortunately Kurt doesn’t like to perform emotional music. He’s far more comfortable with entertaining an audience than with speaking to them. Blaine tries hard to find a middle ground, something fun and sexy with just enough emotion to give it gravity.

_“Let’s do Mercy, who doesn’t love a little Duffy? You and Mercedes killed it at that festival we did, I was so impressed.”_

_“Blaine I could get up there and sing twinkle twinkle and you’d be impressed.”_

Besides, Kurt says, if they’re doing this duet for a major talent scout he wants it to be on a song that isn’t all about cheating (or even the desire to do so) which is funny considering Kurt’s views on romance and sex (and how one has no place with the other). It becomes more and more clear to Blaine that Kurt wants so much out of the night that he won’t let himself hope for, won’t let himself reach for, and Blaine would give anything to pull the stars out of the sky for him, but he knows that what Kurt really needs is the courage to reach for them. Kurt isn’t convinced, no matter how many times Blaine tells him his instincts are good and his voice even better. So Blaine rallies the others together and calls for a vote; they all agree that this time Kurt should be front man on the number and should have song choice. Out voted he blinks a little too much and calls Blaine crazy, says that if the number is a flop they’ll all know who to blame, but when he hugs Blaine Kurt holds him like Blaine’s the only solid thing he knows.

_“Thank you. I hope I don’t let you down.”_

Kurt deliberates for days, throwing sheet music around the apartment and agonizing over perfectly good song choices like a mad thing. None of the others want to comment on his anxious state for fear of driving him to the breaking point. Blaine is elected to intervene because Blaine is the only one they count on being able to make Kurt stay if he decides the pressure is too much and needs to bolt.

_“Everything we’ve tried so far just isn’t right! I don’t know why you guys picked me to do this, I’m no good with these sappy emotive ballads. We’re going to look so juvenile because I don’t know what they want to hear!”_

_“Forget the scout, just forget everybody. You didn’t always sing for them. You’ve told me remember, about what this means to you, you’ve shown me before and I can’t figure out why you’re letting it go now, out here where I think we need it the most… Maybe that’s it, Kurt. Maybe you need to stop thinking about what everyone wants to hear and just figure out what you want to say.”_

Kurt stares into him, not speaking, and then finally.

_“To you?”_ He asks. _“It’s a duet… I’m not standing up there on my own, I’m standing with you. Whatever I say, it includes you.”_ Kurt has a way of looking at Blaine that makes him feel as if he’s glass, transparent but never hollow. Blaine knows by that look that he wants to know what Blaine expects, so Blaine tells him.

_“Say whatever you want to say Kurt, I’ll come along for the ride. That’s the great thing about duets. You can share someone else’s experiences.”_

Kurt’s choice makes his heart leap into his throat and he has to swallow it back down, along with the wild hope the title on the sheet music springs inside. He will not go back on his word, not this soon. He will read nothing into the song and let Kurt tell whatever story he wants to tell through it.

The night of the show arrives and everyone is on their A game. Blaine knows that when Kurt really sings the way he loved to in high school (the way he has in their private dorm room concerts) that it’s from the heart. When he sings like this he goes to a place where he is nothing but candid, his vulnerable throat on metaphorical display, open for all too real injuries. So before their duet Blaine grabs him by the shoulders and tells him that he has everything he needs to succeed. He is amazing and they are going to kill this thing, because they’ve sung and danced it a million times by then and it’s beautiful and so very Kurt; there won’t be a dry eye in the house.

_If you want a lover_  
I'll do anything you ask me to  
And if you want another kind of love  
I'll wear a mask for you  
If you want a partner  
Take my hand  
Or if you want to strike me down in anger  
Here I stand  
I'm your man 

Seeing the song on paper and standing still while Kurt sang those words in practice had made Blaine’s heart skip a few beats. Now Blaine stands center stage as Kurt moves around him like gentle flowing water, the slow sultry rhythm of the song carried by his angelic voice—gone achingly deep as he grips the microphone like it’s his only lifeline. Kurt bares himself to his audience with every word sung, makes it hard to breathe. Every last note has bones made of longing and Blaine can’t help but lean towards him like a moth drawn to flame, he’s something so resplendent. It’s a relief when it’s his verse to sing, when Blaine can put his mind to the choreographed movements and allow his hands to reach.

_If you want a boxer_  
I will step into the ring for you  
And if you want a doctor  
I'll examine every inch of you 

_If you want a driver_  
Climb inside  
Or if you want to take me for a ride  
You know you can  
I'm your man 

He gets to touch, because Kurt said he could, because Kurt always allows him to feel more and see more than he allows any of the others. And yet Blaine is always starved for him. He’s starved for touches like these, a hand to hip as they chase each other across stages and minutes, a thigh to thigh as they sway in close, drawn by each others gravity. He’s always known it mentally but now he knows it with his flesh, that Kurt holds his heart because when he’s escaping to the other side of the stage, spinning off like a lost coin, something hot and horrible throbs in Blaine’s chest; he could whine.

Kurt closes his eyes and tilts his head back and then he’s singing these words they’ve ached to hear, practically growling them with pent up frustration, need driving his voice to newer and deeper depths and Blaine could shake with the effort it takes not to believe there’s more to any of it than just lyrics.

_Ah, the moons too bright_  
The chains too tight  
The beast won't go to sleep  
I've been running through these promises to you  
That I made and I could not keep  
Ah but a man never got a woman back  
Not by begging on his knees  
Oh I'd crawl to you baby  
And I'd fall at your feet  
Oh I'd howl at your beauty  
Like a dog in heat  
And I'd claw at your heart  
And I'd tear at your sheet  
I'd say please, please  
I'm your man 

Just because Kurt reaches for him, doesn’t mean these words are Blaine’s. Just because he’s so beautiful it’s terrible and Kurt is finally singing about something that matters to him with the most naked need in his eyes, doesn’t mean what he means he needs is Blaine. They always flirt on stage, that’s why their duets are so damn popular. They sing around, to, and about each other whenever they get the opportunity and this is just another performance, same as the others.

The reality of it hurts so much he starts to cry. His eyes are stinging as he sings from his own heart, tells the truth he knows, and doesn’t regret a single moment of the anguish it brings him. He’d live for this if he could, live for Kurt if Kurt would let him. So maybe it’s good that Kurt won’t.

_And if you've got to sleep_  
A moment on the road  
I will steer for you  
And if you want to work the street alone  
I'll disappear for you  
If you want a father for your child  
Or only want to walk with me a while  
Across the sand  
I'm your man 

Except Blaine has every shift in Kurt’s eyes memorized, every tilt and twitch, and this is the way Kurt’s eyes get bright when he’s exposed. This is Kurt bare handed and palms up, his voice shaking with the strength of his emotions. He sings what he can’t bring himself to express with spoken words. His voice warbles, audible flawed perfection, and though the audience roars as it fades Kurt doesn’t so much as blink. The only person in his wet eyes is Blaine, and that’s when Blaine knows for sure the words were for him. This is what Kurt wanted to say.

_If you want a lover_  
I'll do anything you ask me to  
And if you want another kind of love  
I'll wear a mask for you. 

The message is clear but Blaine can’t answer because they are on stage and the applause is thunderous in his ears but not so loud as his heart. There are drinks to be had and talks with important people about regular gigs, and there are people people everywhere. Blaine can’t remember the last time he ever felt so surrounded by people. He doesn’t drag Kurt away from it because he was so fantastic and he deserves every last bit of the attention being showered on him.

People think they’re dating and for once Kurt doesn’t correct them. There are people watching them as they watch each other. They dance that night like their blood is hot, they press their bodies together like they mean it (like they’re going places) and they don’t say a word about what it means or where they’re going. All their words they left on the stage and what they have still to say is better said in the movement of their hips.

They are the first of their friends to leave for home and they’re naked almost as quick as it takes to shut their bedroom door.

What Blaine does is simply to take. He takes the bruising pressure of the doorknob against his back, the smarting of his knuckles as Kurt grips his wrists and pins him in place, the back of his palms smacking against wood. He takes in Kurt’s breath, opens for a plundering tongue that moves with such desperation Blaine feels choked with it. He takes every scratch of Kurt’s nails as they tear at his clothing while taking for himself the taste of Kurt’s skin and sweat as he sucks and bites at Kurt’s neck.

He takes the plunge with open heart and he trembles with the violent fear of firsts; because it’s only as Kurt pushes inside him that fist time that he realizes how he has saved this, kept this for this one man because Kurt is _it_ , the one man he trusts inside his walls to see where he is soft. Kurt is beginning and end and the push of his cock inside is not so much a breach but permission, like a key sliding into lock, a boat coming into harbor. It feels of coming home and it’s perfect in every way that it can possibly be perfect. They both want more of it almost as fast as they’re having it. Kurt fucks tears into his eyes and Blaine has never heard a sound so right as his name in that wrecked breathy shout.

Later when he reflects Blaine will think it feels like the beginning of the last of a trilogy, an end at its beginning.

For now, all there is the beginning. He has finished every first but one and all that is left to do is give his heart up for the test. He’s so unprepared it’s terrifying but so grateful for the gift of Kurt that he never expected to get that all he can do is sob.

_“Blaine, don’t cry, please I didn’t mean to hurt you.”_

_“K-Kurt.”_

_“Please, please just stop. I’m not… I didn’t, I should have gone slower. Shit! Here I’ll get—”_

_“D-don’t. Please, don’t leave.”_

_“I-I won’t. Not this time.”_ A gentle stroke to his tear stained cheeks connects trembling flesh to trembling flesh as Blaine reaches up to touch his wrist. Blaine is the one sobbing like a ninny, but Kurt’s not any less broken by what they’ve done. _“I’ve never really been anybody’s boyfriend, not like how you want me to be, but I’ll try… okay. I want to try, just… don’t hate me, please? I know we can’t go back from this. I shouldn’t have let it happen, but I- I wanted you. I’ve wanted you for so long.”_

It’s okay that Kurt can’t say anything yet about how he feels beyond desire, and it’s okay that he seems to think they’re doomed from the start, because Blaine knows Kurt, and Blaine knows that Kurt would never jeopardize their friendship for anything less than love. It’s okay because they share the same weakness.

_“How long?”_ he asks with a watery smile and Kurt buries his head in Blaine’s shoulder and just breathes. Just when Blaine has accepted that he isn’t going to get any sort of answer to that question tonight, even in the form of subtext, Kurt sucks in a shaky breath and lets it out in a mumble of speech that almost gets lost between Kurt’s lips pressed to Blaine’s sweaty flesh.

_“Feels like forever.”_


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  _Staring at the bottom of your glass_  
>  _Hoping one day you'll make a dream last_  
>  _But dreams come slow and they go so fast_  
>  _You see her when you close your eyes_  
>  _Maybe one day you'll understand why_  
>  _Everything you touch surely dies_  
>  \- "Let Her Go", Passenger.

If I know you like I know you, you’re worried because this book is running out of pages. You’ve already glanced at the last page, worrying your bottom lip with your teeth when you confirm that there isn’t going to be some jump to a time in our lives where we made more sense and had our heads on straighter. Now you wonder what could possibly be in my head, taking us here, today of all days when you are barley holding onto hope as it is. Darling, I know that you think what follows is the worst of us, and perhaps it is. I’ve stopped keeping score of our worsts and I’ll do my utmost best to help you forget them too. There is no score for us to settle, we’ve got to let them go lest we’d crack beneath the burden of debt to each other owed; that’s the truth of being human.

So if darling, you are afraid that because we came together once and split apart, that we are doomed to repeat such patterns, then we owe it to ourselves to look behind us and see those boys for who and what they were. What they were was mostly young, a little bit stupid, and a whole lot of crazy. _Who_ they were was love; you and I, we are love the way storybooks won’t talk about it. We’re love when it’s glorious and when it’s brutal, love that starves and screams when people are selfish and tiny, love that endures with a strong back and weathered hands. Grown up love isn’t often talked about. It’s not the love you hold in your dreams or hear songs sung to, but it’s the love that works. It’s the love you learn. They say you only learn by looking back. The bravest man I know taught me how to look at myself even when I’m scared of what I’ll find there.

The first time Kurt and Blaine “get together” is not their beginning by any means, but when people ask how long they’ve been a thing it’s easier to work from the date they first had sex and agreed to be something more. They could pick a thousand dates you see, a thousand and more moments when they felt like a thing together, because they’ve never truly been apart from the day they met. But when they wake up on a sunny morning in October with a note from David stuck to the door _‘Finally! Also: coming in at 9am whether you’re decent or not’_ , they agree (sober and in the light of day) that a thing is finally what they are.

Being together doesn’t change as much as either of them thought it would; mostly it serves to highlight how long they’ve been together already. They still go to their favorite eats and sing their favorite songs when they come on the radio. They still squabble over nonsensical things and cuddle on couches because Kurt is tactile and Blaine likes to be leaned on.

Kurt doesn’t like the term boyfriends but agrees to use it because Blaine can’t and won’t be a hook up. He agrees to it because he cares about Blaine and doesn’t want the light in his eyes to dim so quickly, not yet. Blaine’s so grateful to be able to call Kurt his, that he doesn’t care that people don’t stop inviting Kurt out on the dance floor, or to places more private. Hell, everyone they know thought they were hooking up before this anyway and that never stopped them before. Kurt gives up hook ups and Blaine gives up his right to be jealous over harmless flirting. Rome wasn’t built in a day and he thinks Kurt has a point that it’s a lot to ask someone to stop finding others attractive just because _they_ need the emotional security of thinking they own another person.

Blaine doesn’t want to own Kurt, except everywhere and in every which way that he does. He knows it by the acid taste in his mouth when Kurt’s leaning on a bar letting some guy chat him up, trading glances and favorable signals, while something like fire smolders in Blaine’s gut. He does want to own the right to look at Kurt’s body, the sole rights to touch, the sole right to _want_. He want’s Kurt to be so his that it’s stamped all over him and people’s eyes slide away like they can’t grasp the concept of a Kurt that isn’t Blaine’s. That’s the reality of love and he knew going in that Kurt doesn’t want to be owned, just as Kurt knew Blaine wanted and needed monogamy, so the concession is fair. Kurt can flirt and be flirted with, so long as he doesn’t actually hook up with anyone else.

Except Blaine can’t hold up his end of the bargain and they fight about the flirting, constantly.

The other constant is sex. They run hot like they’ve got suns bursting in their cores, like their time is sand in an hourglass. They have sex because Kurt loves sex and Blaine loves having sex with Kurt now that it’s allowed; he’s in truth an addict. They have sex when it’s good and fun, sex when it’s bad and they’re fighting, sex to make up for fighting, sex instead of sorry, sex to say what words have failed them and sex to avoid talking altogether. The only time they don’t have sex is when they’re drunk. That’s Blaine’s rule and not Kurt’s, and no matter how Kurt complains against it he won’t budge.

It’s not that Blaine has anything against drinking, or thinks the sex would be bad (sex with Kurt could never be that) it’s a purely selfish reason but he can’t let it go. Before, when he was just Kurt’s friend and everybody but him was allowed to touch him this way, Kurt drank like a fish and went home with whoever’s bait was shiniest. It was so far beneath him and so false it felt dirty to watch. Blaine has this fault, this need to push Kurt towards _better_ things, and maybe that’s wrong, maybe he should stop pushing before he pushes Kurt right out of his arms, but he can’t give up this one distinction. When they are together, when Kurt is inside him and everything in him is molten and easily shifted, they’ll do it with clear eyes.

It’s good. They’re good together because they always have been, because Blaine will forget to set his alarm at night and Kurt has his wake up time memorized and always sets an extra just in case (even though he leaves out for his retail job hours earlier). They’re good together because when Kurt comes from work dull eyed and distant in a way that tells Blaine something inside him is shrinking, their hands fit like they were molded together from clay and Blaine knows how to get a non-romantic to slow dance in the kitchen while macaroni boils on the stove.

It’s good when they’re walking in the sun and taking runs through parks. It’s good when they are surrounded by friends and family, easy and accepting and each of them claiming to have always known where they were headed. It’s good talking about every hope and every dream, staying up late and leaning together on the couch whispering in the dark. It’s good even when they’re screaming at each other because it’s always clearest then how much each desperately fears losing the other.

But it’s not always good like that. It hurts to think but the bad might even outweigh the good. There are problems you see.

The problem on Kurt’s end Kurt could tell you better. The problem on Blaine’s is simply this. While he knows everything there is to know about Kurt (where he is weak and where he is strong, where he is cracked and where his edges overlap to bridge all his gaps) it is easier to point out where Kurt needs a light shed, than to come out of his shadow. Kurt’s existence is a storm that rips through the room. Who would waste time looking at the man curled up in a corner when there is such a spectacle as that to behold? Kurt is fireworks and bells, Blaine is a still pond. Sometimes he feels like black water, cloying and deep, where a body could easily sink beneath the surface and quietly drown. He would have drowned if not for Kurt, who is made of sky and high places that Blaine reaches for without any right to.

Blaine is all for Kurt and Kurt for all, and he gives too much without keeping much for himself. He always has. His father taught him how to pluck his wings and hide behind every effort to please. Kurt is a crash course in selfish behavior and cannibalism, he takes and takes like a vacuum until he can’t anymore.

If there’s one thing you take from the following let it be this: the greatest gift Kurt ever gave me was the courage to fight for myself. Darling, if you remember anything about those boys we were, remember that you were not the only one broken at our start. Remember that the intent to protect (even wrongly executed) speaks to a heart that knows how to love. There is much I have doubted over the years my dear, but your love has never been one of them. That is why it hurt so much.

For all that it might have been bruised Kurt’s heart belongs to Blaine. It would take a beating before it allowed Blaine to get swallowed up, even by its own insatiable hungers. And that is perhaps the fear that drives Kurt to build walls between them, to remind Blaine with every word and deed that nobody can promise forever and that there are no happily ever afters. Certainly not here, certainly not with a man who increasingly has more and more belittling things to say about Blaine’s faith in the unsaid and unseen. But Blaine is a hopeful, a wide eyed open hearted believer, and he’d sing it from the rooftops if Kurt would let him, how he is determined to love this one man until his dying day. And he would have. Died that is.

_“I don’t understand why you don’t want to come home with me for thanksgiving! You’ve been home with me loads of times.”_

_“It’s different now that we’re dating. You know how your mom and Regina get, they’ll smother us. And I just got your dad to like me because he thought I’d never actually date you and you’d eventually get fed up and he could rope you into a proper corporate death. Then I went and sucked you into a cover band and dated you. If you bring me home for a holiday they’ll think we’re going to walk down the aisle next and mark my words there will be a blood bath.”_

_“What about your family? They invited me for Christmas and you don’t have a problem with that.”_

_“Yeah well my dad doesn’t have the mindset of a twelve year old girl and hasn’t been planning our happy nuptials since the day we met, no offense to Regina.”_

_“Okay fine whatever, I’ll go home by myself for thanksgiving. And maybe Christmas too.”_

_“Wait are you mad? You’re mad because I don’t want to hold your hand and make goo goo eyes in front of your fami—hey! Don’t throw shit at me Blaine. Are you brain damaged?”_

_“It’s a pillow, you’ll live. I’d suffocate you with it if I thought it would get you to just SHUT UP about how stupid you think everything I want to do is.”_

_“God, grow up. I don’t want to do it, okay. You don’t need to make a big gay drama out of it.”_

_“Why can’t you ever just let yourself enjoy what’s happening between us? Why do you have to try and twist it and make it seem like… like it’s nothing just because you’re scared of it!”_

_“Scared? The only thing I’m scared of is your reaction when whatever fantasy you’re living in disappoints you. I told you I’m not that guy Blaine; the guy writing poetry and making love in a lilac field. I’m not going to pretend like I’m sorry you thought I was something different when I told you from the beginning that I wasn’t!”_

_“Yeah I’ve heard all that before. Well it’s not like you didn’t know about me either. This is who I am, these are the things I want and it hurt’s that none of it is worth your time. I’m sorry but that’s me, real fucking stupid and a big girl or whatever you want to call me—like you think that shit doesn’t hurt. Why is this the Kurt Hummel show and why do I have to give up everything I want just to keep you happy?”_

_“Give up? What is it that you think you’ve given up for me?”_

_“What haven’t I? I put up with you making fun of me, with you flirting with everything that breathes, with—”_

_“I knew this was about that guy at Tom’s party! I knew it. You said you could be a big boy and handle it but I just knew you couldn’t. Why did I think you could? I **knew** it.”_

_“Kurt you were in his lap!”_

_“And! And what Blaine? Did I fuck him in his lap? Did I?”_

_“Well you might as well have! Everybody kept asking me about it and I had to pretend like it was funny or something. Kurt do you have any idea how shit like that makes me feel?!”_

_“It shouldn’t make you feel anything! Because it doesn’t **mean** anything, Blaine! I agreed to be with you, not some random guy I met at a party. What does it matter to you if I sit in his lap? Why does that make you so damn insecure?”_

_“It hurts! I don’t want it to and I’ve tried to be bigger than I am but the truth is I can’t and it just **fucking** hurts! You think I enjoy hearing how much you have to give up to be with me? Seeing all these guys who you could be with if you weren’t just stuck with me, and you just rubbing it in every day letting some asshole pull you into his lap like I’m not even there. It hurts that my own boyfriend doesn’t care enough about me not to make me look like the world’s biggest idiot, falling all over every guy in the room every time we go out.”_

The problems in their relationship are self-evident. They are ever present and always pulling them both in different directions and yet, Blaine will let go for nothing.

_“I care about you, Blaine, but I’m not going to change who I am for you. You told me you didn’t need more from me than I wanted to give… but I think we both know you lied. I think we’re both lying to ourselves. You don’t trust me any more than I trust me. That’s the real problem here. You honestly think I’ll do it, you think one day I’ll just get bored and go fuck somebody else and it bothers you that everyone else thinks it too... including me.”_

_“What? Is that not supposed to bother me now either?”_

_“It’s supposed to bother you, especially when it’s true. Typically you’d leave something this dysfunctional. You should Blaine. Maybe we both should before…”_

_“Don’t.”_

_“Blaine.”_

_“I’m not leaving you.”_

_“Because you’re stubborn?”_

_“Because, I love you.”_

_“Same difference in the end.”_

_“You won’t. Okay, I know that, I do, I swear I do.”_

_“How do you know I won’t?”_

_“Because I know you. I know you so much better than that even if you don’t. I know you’d never do anything to hurt me because you… well, you care about me. Don’t you?”_

_“Oh Blaine.”_

When Kurt kisses him it’s almost tender. It quickly turns needy, and he grips Blaine like he needs him for anchorage, like he’ll be blown away if he doesn’t grip on tight enough. Kurt begs for Blaine that night and sliding inside of Kurt’s warm body is like opening his eyes on a morning. It’s a state of being somewhere between dreams and harsh realities, the clearest moment a body can experience. In it he knows all that is, all that could be, and is content with everything he has. Here with Kurt’s flesh beneath his hands what he has is all that he needs, the world is his and he grasps it with sure hands. Here with Kurt’s fingers cutting crescent moons down his back, what he has is another life pulsing hot around him. The gift it is to be allowed into the core of something so splendid as another body, inside _Kurt’s_ body, reduces him to a greedy child. He needs it all, wants it all, will gulp without so much as a moment’s thought to savor it. If he presses hard enough they cannot be undone.

Except of course they can. You can’t fuck yourself into someone’s heart. They have to let you in and fight to keep you there.

Blaine falls into sated sleep and Kurt cries himself to sleep that night. Blaine won’t know it for years. He won’t suspect either because after that things between them get better. Kurt takes off work to make them both breakfast and wake Blaine with a blow job he says is apology for the guy at the party. They take their time through breakfast and Kurt sits beside him, the quiet between them not uncomfortable but new and untried. There is a tentative brush of Kurt’s fingers on the nape of his neck and Blaine goes stiff, waiting to see what Kurt will do next. Kurt’s breathing seems to have paused while he hesitates and then his hand slides slowly into the curls at the base of Blaine’s skull in an idle way. They go on eating and breathing like such tender gestures are their norm, their smiles soft and private.

They go to the Anderson’s for thanksgiving and Kurt is correct; Elaine’s eyes are misty whenever she looks at them, Regina is smug and takes every opportunity she can to tease them and Mitchell is stony and far more cutting to Kurt than he has been since they were underclassmen. Maybe this new softer Kurt is a Kurt with less cover because each of Mitchells digs finds their mark with far more accuracy than usual and Blaine can’t stand the way Kurt curls in on himself, like a man being kicked.

And he hates that Kurt doesn’t feel safe to want good things, doesn’t feel like he deserves care and consideration and the best that life has to offer just because so many people have tried to kick him down and put him into whatever place they feel he belongs. He hates that his own father is one of those people. When Tyler and Regina surprise everyone by announcing their engagement Mitchell says he’s glad one of his kids has their head on straight. Kurt grips Blaine’s hand under the table like he’s afraid to let go.

The first time Blaine ever stood up to his father it was about his work and Kurt gave him the reason to do it. The second (and not the last) time he does it it’s about who he is and this time Kurt _is_ the reason he does it. Kurt who is amazing, who has chosen Blaine of all people to give his fragile heart to, is his choice; his sexuality itself isn’t a choice, but even had it been he’d have chosen Kurt and whatever their future holds. He can only hope that should he one day be blessed with fatherhood he’ll never make his own children choose between the love of a parent and the love they want for life.

He corners his father that night in the garage and stands up for what he wants.

_“I’ve done everything I could think of not to disappoint you, and now I realize the only way to do that is not to be me at all. You tell me you love me and I want to believe that you do, you’re my dad, of course I want to believe that but you know what? It’s not worth anything saying you love me when you hate this part of me, when you care more about what you wanted for me than how happy I am doing the things that make me happy. **Kurt** makes me happy dad!”_

_“Kurt’s a kid Blaine, a good kid, but a kid! You know this isn’t serious between you and I just don’t want to see you throw away your future on a college phase.”_

_“Kurt is not a phase to me dad, he’s the love of my life! And I hope you did mean him just now, because my being gay is not either. Dad this is me. I’m gay. Gay, gay, gay, one hundred percent gold star gay and I’ll be gay with or without Kurt, but right now we’re very happy to get as gay as we can possibly get together. So either you get with that or you don’t, but either way I’m done talking about it. It’s your choice. I’m not coming someplace I don’t feel welcome and where Kurt isn’t welcome, neither am I.”_

When he storms inside the house the rest of his family is gathered suspiciously near the door and they all look so guilty he doesn’t have to guess if they heard. Kurt’s eyes are glassy as he watches Blaine with concern and guilt, and Blaine can’t stand the thought that he feels guilty about any of what just happened, so Blaine walks up to him and kisses him in full view of everyone.

_“I love you and I’m not sorry about that.”_

Kurt blinks away tears he’ll never shed in front of Blaine’s family. He lets Blaine hold him and that’s enough for them both.

_“I can’t believe you’re real sometimes. I’m still waiting to wake up.”_

His mother cuts them both big pieces of pie and won’t hear of Kurt apologizing.

They live something of a dream that December.

A few weeks before Christmas Kurt spends what little money they have on a surprise carriage ride to the ice rink and he barely makes any snarky comments about the couples that surround them on the ice looking like they stepped right out of a holiday film (although the lady in the reindeer stockings and antlered hat is just asking for it). They swing around and flail on the ice like idiots until their cheeks are flushed and frost bit, and when they get hot coco they lean on each other for heat and closeness and share breath and slow kisses. Kurt’s romantic gestures are tentative and abrupt at times, like a colt learning to walk, but Blaine is delighted with them, delighted with _him_ and this unspoken turn toward tender and bare they’ve taken. He’s afraid to say anything about it for fear that Kurt will startle like a deer and bolt. He doesn’t want to bother messing with a good thing.

Blaine doesn’t need to in the end; their friends do plenty of commenting.

Everybody knows that Blaine has been in love with Kurt for years, and everybody knows that Kurt is not one for long-term commitment, but that December they begin to wonder if this might not be it, if Blaine Anderson might not actually be the guy that gets Kurt Hummel to settle down. It feels good, these new whispers, certainly much better than the ones before questioning Kurt’s fidelity and Blaine’s sanity. He hates all of the talk, about them, about their relationship, about _Kurt_ , because none of them really know Kurt. Blaine hates even more that he’s not immune, that their words get to him and Kurt knows that now, but he thinks it might all turn out for the best because Kurt is opening up now, letting himself enjoy the romantic side of caring about someone and maybe just maybe, Blaine hopes, maybe Kurt will be ready to say ‘I love you’. They are just over two months old and finally going strong, so maybe soon.

That Christmas they go to Kurt’s family in Ohio and it’s like stepping into a postcard. Carol and Burt are as wonderful and welcoming as always, Finn and his girlfriend Quinn fun and quite the show when together. They all have high school stories to share and Kurt blushes as they go through old photos and videos that largely feature him as a lippy but somehow still doe eyed teenager with baby fat still clinging to his cheeks. Blaine loves that boy because it’s like finally putting a face to all the parts of Kurt that he loves best, the parts he tries so hard to hide from the world. Loving that boy is something everybody in the room has in common and that’s what makes the whole thing feel like family.

Snowflakes on Kurt’s cheeks and eyelashes are his favorite, and it’s hard not to stare at him at any given moment without aching for how beautiful he is. They walk in the snow and then band together to murder Finn with snowballs when he catches them by surprise attack. When they are snow soaked and Kurt is pretending to be pissed with the whole thing they trudge inside to get dry and warm and let Carol laugh at them. It’s after Blaine has showered and changed into something warm that he overhears Kurt talking with his dad in the kitchen.

_“We’re not ‘living together’ living together dad, there are six of us crammed into that apartment.”_

“Yeah I know but you guys still share a bed don’t you?”

“More for lack of space… but yes.”

“I aint mad kid, you’re an adult. I just like knowing you’re happy up there. You are happy, right? He treats you all right?”

“He… dad he treats me perfect. So much better than I deserve.”

“That’s good,” Burt says and Blaine glows because he has never heard something so close to love come out of Kurt’s mouth and he’s content to wait until Kurt can put it into words. So he backs up a bit and makes a bunch of noise to signal his arrival and joins his boyfriend and his father in the kitchen. After a late dinner they all curl up on the couches in the living room to watch an old holiday movie. Kurt’s head ends up on Blaine’s shoulder, his body pressed close, a hand held loosely in Blaine’s, the other playing idly with the comforter thrown over their laps.

Some couple on screen is talking about marriage when Finn looks to them and grins.

_“I’m glad you two finally got it together. Do I get to be one of the best men when you get married?”_

Kurt goes stiff against him and Blaine sees Quinn elbow Finn in the gut.

_“Ouch. What? Look at them they’re practically married already it’s not like they don’t know—”_

_“Shut it Finn,”_ Kurt hisses. _“We’re twenty-two. Nobody gets married at twenty-two.”_

Some people do, Blaine thinks, but Kurt’s right. They’re young and they’ve got plenty of time. Blaine is content to go back to watching the movie but Kurt doesn’t seem as comfortable as he had been the rest of the night.

Kurt can’t get back to comfortable at all after that. As the winter bleeds into a new year and whatever magic the holiday season brought with it begins to fade they’re faced with a new year of bills and jobs that don’t quite pay them. By February the dream has all but died, each of them turning their thoughts from the allure of music and stardom to things more practical. Though they do their best to encourage each other to keep at it they know in their heart of hearts that most of them will give in to the pressure and trade their bohemian lifestyle for dependable income.

Blaine thinks working at Blackbird, even the corporate side of things, wouldn’t be so terrible. He has a business degree after all and at least at the record company all of his success will be one hundred percent his own making. Yeah, one day probably he’ll go work at UB and take over for his dad but that doesn’t have to be for years and he wants a career of his own first. He gets in contact with Ren and by March he’s got an entry level job and a new future ahead of him.

Kurt doesn’t know what he wants to do. There’s too much drama in fashion and no one has contacted him about his designs like he’d hoped. Neither of them mentions the fact that half of the drama could have been avoided had Kurt not slept with his mentor. Who knows what could have happened with his designs then, but it’s pointless to lament now. Blaine still wishes Kurt believed in himself enough to keep trying, to try any of the things he’s so unfairly good at: singing, performing, design, Kurt could do so many great things if he just _tried_.

He signs up with a temp agency and starts temp work at an office and Blaine can’t figure out for the life of him why. Kurt hates it there, it’s so obvious in the gray of his skin and tightness of his shoulders. He’s so miserable every evening Blaine can’t stand to send him off to work every day knowing what it does to him. So when the community playhouse announces auditions for a musical he swears to himself he’ll get Kurt up on that stage, because if that’s the only place that doesn’t suck the life out of his eyes Blaine won’t ever let him step off it.

_“I have nothing prepared. What would I even sing?”_

_“What were you singing in the shower this morning?”_

_“Black Velvet?”_

_“Yes! Sing that.”_

_“Blaine I can’t!”_

_“Why not? You obviously felt something about that song. Just recapture whatever it was you were feeling when you were covered in soap suds and you’ll get a part for sure. Come on. You and I have a date with an empty auditorium. I’m not hearing any of your excuses Mr. Hummel.”_

Blaine drags him back to their old campus where he has bribed a friend for use of the auditorium. He plants Kurt center stage and he parks himself on the piano bench and tells him to sing.

_“Blaine there isn’t even music.”_

_“Kurt, you and music are synonyms. Don’t tell me you need accompaniment to feel a song.”_

And so challenged he sings. Kurt makes something happen on that stage that day, something Blaine can feel crackling in the air like lightning. He makes a song about the rise and fall of Elvis something personal, something haunting and sensuous with every movement of his body and Blaine can only stare and wonder how this stunning enigmatic being is his. He wants so much for Kurt to believe in himself, to believe in them, and now he thinks maybe this is it. Maybe this is the moment when Kurt will finally get that he is made of starlight and crowns and Blaine would be happy to hold him in his hands forever and just let him glitter.

This is that moment for Kurt, the moment he realizes the depth of both their feelings. It’s not anything like Blaine hoped it would be.

Kurt won’t audition and when he can’t come up with a good reason they fight for the first time in weeks.

That weekend Kurt decides he wants to go to some party one of the guys at the office is throwing, instead of having what has become a habitual night in for them. Blaine worries that he pushed too hard on the play thing, suspects this is just Kurt reminding them both that Blaine doesn’t manage his life and lets him go, planning ways to apologize and mend the distance between them the next day. He falls asleep and is woken to Kurt crawling into bed at the crack of dawn and his hands are everywhere. He smells like booze and someone else’s cologne and wants to fuck with David snoring across the room. This is everything Blaine doesn’t want, so he pushes and pushes and finally has to kick for Kurt to get the message and everything stings in his chest and his eyes as they yell at each other. They wake David and then the rest of the house when Kurt slams out of the bedroom.

_“You won’t fuck me, I can’t fuck anyone else. So fucking glad I signed on for this Blaine, you really make it worth a guys while.”_

Rachel comes storming out of the girl’s room and all hell breaks loose. David stopped being amused by their fights and libidos ages ago and it’s expressed by more than one mouth that night that they are all tired of living like sardines in a can, that they’ll murder each other if they attempt another year like this.

Their time here is coming to an end, Blaine feels it even then, but he doesn’t want to believe the feeling of foreboding in his gut. Just because this phase of life is ending doesn’t mean he and Kurt won’t be fine. They will get over this little hump and move out into a place of their own when their lease is up in June and things will go back to good for them. That will happen because they care about each other, because Blaine loves Kurt with everything he has and Kurt… Kurt has never expressly said he loves Blaine in spoken words. But Blaine doesn’t need spoken words, he needs _Kurt_ and Kurt is there so he can be happy with that. He can.

Things do not pick up. They go rapidly downhill as if Kurt wants to drive them to ground in a fiery wreck. The crazy thing is Blaine knows that and he doesn’t think once about abandoning ship. He does the opposite. It doesn’t matter how nasty the fight, how hurtful the things they say, how much Kurt slices him up with tongue and teeth, he always forgives. He puts it behind them because he can’t carry it and Kurt at the same time, can’t chase Kurt down if he’s weighed down by his own heart, so he doesn’t let it get heavy. He will prove to Kurt that he hasn’t lied, that Kurt can depend on him for always if it takes every last breath in his body because he can’t live with anything else. He lets Kurt blast holes in him until it’s almost unrecognizable what he’s doing it all for. Love doesn’t feel like anything to sing about anymore, but its love and that’s all he has to believe in.

The thing is the more absolution Blaine gives the more Kurt does to prove he doesn’t deserve it. It’s a game they are both aware they’re playing. How far will Kurt go and how much can Blaine forgive before they face the inevitable? Blaine thinks he could forgive anything, so long as he still felt Kurt loved him. Kurt thinks he would do anything to prove Blaine can’t forgive everything.

By April both their families are worried. They don’t see it all of course, but they see enough and hear enough through the grapevine to know that things are not well. Blaine tries not to worry them, not to worry himself, insisting that things will turn around when Kurt’s insecurities are finally put to rest. When he sees how very much Blaine is not going to leave him, not ever, then Kurt will want to stay again. Right?

He thinks that as hard as he can when Kurt is out every night, absolutely refuses to imagine where he is and who he could be with. He tells himself that can say and do anything else he wants, but Kurt wouldn’t do that to him, to _them_ because deep down inside he does love him. Blaine knows he does. He just needs time.

Until one weekend in late April he goes to visit Regina and he realizes they’ve run out of it.

 _“Blaine, what are you doing?”_ She asks it so simply, just that. For the life of him Blaine doesn’t know. He’s plucking his wings and giving the feathers to Kurt, only instead of flying Kurt’s scattering them to the wind. He doesn’t know when he became this person. He fears maybe he always was, he has just chosen a different object of worship this time. Once it was his father, now it’s his lover he sacrifices for, neither of them are doing very much to fulfill him.

He loves Kurt but the reality is they are far from healthy at present and something has got to give, because Blaine can’t do this to himself. He can’t live like this. He owes to himself everything he has tried so hard to push Kurt towards and _he_ is the only one who can reach for it. Even if it means losing the man he loves, even if it means saying goodbye. Sometimes courage is just being able to say goodbye.

Maybe it’s coming to this realization that keeps him calm when he walks in on Kurt and some blond neither of them know or care to really get to know. Maybe it’s as simple as knowing it was coming. He did, deep in the tired quiet part of him, he did know it was coming to an end.

This is it, his last first. The first time his heart ever truly breaks. It cracks right in two and the halves sit in his chest like heavy lumps, but he doesn’t cry or yell or do any of the things Kurt is clearly expecting. The blond scurries away while Blaine clunks around in the kitchen making coffee staring at his hands like he has never seen them work the machine before.

Kurt did it. He broke their only real rule. He did the one thing he knew Blaine couldn’t forgive and he expects Blaine not to. The funny thing is there’s this part of him that wants to prove him wrong still, this part of him that is all twisted up and bent that might have been love once but now just looks like a mangled mess that no sense can be made of. He has to close that part of himself up now. He has to because whatever love had started in that soil has gone bad, and all that’s growing there now is rot. The boy he’d been when he left their apartment might not have, but he has grown up a bit since then, the age he feels in his bones a testament to this new stripe of adulthood.

Kurt leans against the kitchen door silent and unmoving but for the tears slipping down his cheeks.

 _“I’m sorry.”_ He finally gets out and Blaine sips more coffee, unable to taste a swallow.

_“Are you?”_

_“More than I can say. About everything.”_

_“I’m not… not about everything.”_

_“Blaine?”_ And there’s that sound his voice makes, those notes of wonderment and disbelief, as if he can’t bring himself to believe that Blaine can’t hold every memory of him tainted now. Maybe he gets that. Part of him wants so badly to burn with hate, burn so hot he just opens his mouth and rages heat and flame but he can’t do that to Kurt, not even now. He might hate that most of all.

_“I think I should move out.”_

_“No. I will. This was my fault I—”_

_“No. I knew the risks. I gambled, I lost, and now I’m going to pick up and get myself in order. I think I’m overdue for that. I don’t want to stay here and be reminded of us and frankly I couldn’t sleep in that bed again if you paid me, so I’ll sleep on the couch tonight and start moving my things to Regina’s tomorrow.”_ He doesn’t say that to be cruel. It’s just true. He’ll lose it if he has to touch that bed.

 _“And then?”_ Kurt asks and Blaine knows what he wants to know. They’d loved like idiots and broken apart just like Kurt had always predicted they would, just as Kurt had exhausted every effort in achieving, and now he wants the verdict on the second prediction. Does Blaine hate him? Is everything so broken that they are lost to each other. Blaine doesn’t know. He thinks it very well might be.

 _“And then I don’t want to see you… not for a while.”_ That feels cruel going past his lips, but then again he feels like being a little cruel for once. After all Kurt has been very cruel to him hasn’t he? Maybe learning a few things from Kurt wouldn’t go amiss.

Blaine has to leave now. He doesn’t like himself anymore, doesn’t even know where _Blaine_ went; the man standing in the kitchen is someone made of shards.

Blaine waits to fall apart until he’s on Regina’s doorstep, only he doesn’t know it. One moment he’s coasting along hard as glass and twice as cool and the next he’s in his sister’s arms and he’s falling apart. He crashes with Reina and Tyler until he can afford the rent on a small studio apartment. His father pays out the rest of their lease and it’s the first sign of acceptance he has shown Blaine since Thanksgiving.

Blaine thinks about Kurt constantly. It’s funny; they’ve had the friendliest break up of anyone in their friend group. No screaming, no objects thrown and a mutual understanding that they both need time not seeing each other for a while and yet every last one of them know not to invite one to an event where the other is sure to be. They make it easier on their friends by throwing themselves into work and not having much time to go out, minimizing the nights they have to pretend not to be awkward with each other.

For the first time since they met they aren’t together. They talk about nothing that matters until they talk less and less, probably to avoid the utter shallowness of the whole affair.

Blaine thinks about Kurt every time he closes his eyes to sleep at night.

Their lives go on and they hear of each other in passing. They are content to tell anyone who inquires that they have remained friends despite everything. No promises broken on that score. Blaine wishes Kurt a happy birthday on facebook and likes some of his funnier wall posts and Kurt does the same for him. Blaine even manages to feel some happiness the day Kurt’s status reads ‘Goodbye Temping! Hello freedom’.

Blaine still thinks about Kurt more than he wants to admit.

Kurt’s new job at Clarks takes up even more of his time, and Kurt all but disappears. Before either of them knows it months have become a year and then two going on three. Everyone has grown up and moved on but they are all friends even if they don’t talk but a few times a year.

Blaine thinks about Kurt because he probably always will.

His mother still asks about Kurt occasionally. Blaine parrots back the things he has heard (which isn’t much. Kurt is a ghost flitting about New York either buried in his work or out with guy after guy that nobody bothers keeping track of anymore) or read on facebook and Elaine hmms and haws.

It’s the end of Regina’s long engagement that turns things, saves both their lives (or so she will forever insist).

She invites Kurt to the wedding, which Blaine doesn’t think much about (at least not more than sixty percent of the time anyway) because he honestly doesn’t expect Kurt to come. He’s so busy these days. They both are. Blaine just got promoted and he has no time at all to think about an old college flame and likely neither does the flame. Only he underestimates the power of his sister’s nagging. He gets an email a few weeks before the big day that catches him by surprise. It’s long and full of all the trivialities and pleasantries that have been choking their conversations for the past few years and he doesn’t want to give them any more attention than they deserve so he mostly skims. He notices there’s a post script but he almost doesn’t read it, everything else in the email is so meaningless, until his eyes catch something in the last paragraph of the body. The words ‘one day I’ll take you’ scream out at him and he pauses, because volunteering to spend time together alone is not something they do anymore. They just aren’t friends like that. It has been just under three years and that thought still hurts the same. That’s the reason he goes back to read the top of the paragraph.

_As I have been informed on no less than fifty voicemails, left morning noon and night for the last two weeks, I’ll be attending Regina & Tyler’s nuptials in May. I must admit I thought about just sending a gift. Work has picked up a lot since my promotion and it’s busy busy as I’m sure you know. Congratulations on **your** big promotion by the way! It feels like college all over again doesn’t it? Both of us top of the class. It’s great that we both got what we wanted after all. I just got back from Paris a few weeks ago, a business endeavor mostly, but I had plenty of time for fun while I was there. I uploaded some pictures to facebook that you should look at. You’d love Paris, Blaine, it’s as magical as I remembered. One day I’ll take you._

_Yours,_

_Kurt._

_P.S._

_I love you. I debated for twenty minutes on this post script and if you get it, it’s only because I sent it before I could chicken out. I love you Blaine and telling you that is long overdue. This is not asking you back. I’m not asking for the impossible. I guess I’m asking for that thing you once promised me, the thing I told you I didn’t believe in and that I didn’t need? It’s just that I keep having thoughts like that, about places I want you to see, jokes I want to know if you’d laugh at, food I want you to taste. I have for years and counting and the only conclusion I can come to is that it turns out I do need my best friend. I might be a shitty boyfriend but I think I was a good friend to you once. I’d like to be your friend again. I don’t want to go to Regina’s wedding and pretend like you’re not who I want to laugh and dance. I don’t want to pretend like I’m not missing you so terribly and I don’t think about you every day. I understand if you don’t want to, I wouldn’t if I were you, but I owe you so much more than courage right now so courage is the least I can give. I’ll wait for you on that dance floor, like those movies you love. I of course hope you meet me there, but as these things go it’s your choice. So what do you say, Blaine. Dance with me?_

If anyone still reading this wants to know whether or not Blaine meets Kurt on that dance floor or not, they probably don’t know them very well. But you beloved, know exactly what happened there. You remember walking out and waiting, a lone man lost among the many, and I remember watching you from the back, just a bit satisfied making you wait, while being simultaneously wrecked with nerves, convinced you’d slip away if I blinked. So I kept my eyes open and I drank you in. It had nearly been three years and I was a different man by then, but so were you.

Time had polished your youthful edges until you were sleek and shiny, such sophistication in your stance and dress you stood out even amongst my parents glamorous friends. There was mystery in your eyes, secrets in the turn of your lips, but in three years one thing hadn’t changed. I still wanted to unwrap every inch of you and peel back every new layer. I wanted to know every thought I saw flitting behind those eyes. I still wanted to walk out onto that floor and meet you.

So I did.

If you take anything from this story take that. Yes, there had been great hurt. Yes we both said and did things we must remember to never do again, but that is our key darling, the remembering, and the effort to right where we have wronged. And where that fails there is this: meeting in the middle, putting the past behind us because we can’t carry it and each other at the same time.

It has been almost four years since my sister married, and tomorrow they tell me it’s my turn. I hope so. I hope we will both wear the beautiful suits you designed and I won’t be able to take my eyes off you. I never have been and may I never from this day forth.

So how about it darling? Dance this last dance with me, like those movies I love and you pretend you only tolerate. I of course hope you’re ready for it. I think you know the steps, but as these things go it’s your choice. Either way darling I’m yours.

P.S.

Wedding or no wedding we’re still honeymooning in Venice. You owe me a balcony Hummel.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Kurt & Blaine's journey is continued in Pretty Woman, which is not currently posted on AO3 but you can find it in it's entirety on my Live Journal.


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